GIFT OF NOTES AND SUGGESTIONS FOR BIBLE READINGS, EDITED BY S. R. BRIGGS AND JOHN H. ELLIOTT. " THESE WERE MORE NOBLE THAN THOSE AT THESSALONICA, IN THAT THEY DECEIVED THE WORD WITH ALL READINESS OP MIND, AND SEARCHED THE SCRIPTURES DAILY, WHETHER THESE THINGS WERE SO." Acts vil. II. "SEARCH THE SCRIPTURES." EIGHTEENTH THOUSAND. FLEMING H. REVELL, CHICAGO: NEW YORK: 148 AND 150 MADISON ST. | 12 BIBLE HOUSE Publisher of Evangelical Literature, V 4' Entered according to act of Congrees, in the year 18-79. BY F. H. REVELL, In the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. - PREFACE. THE object of the present publication is to stimulate to m more diligent and systematic study of God's Word. In compiling and preparing the collection of " Notes for Bible Readings " herewith presented to the Christian public, no attempt has been made at an elaborate arrangement 01 subjects, or to give exhaustive explanatory notes in connection with any subject ; but the aim has been rather to collect suck matter as would prove suggestive and awaken further study mmd research into the golden depths of the Word. A large amount of matter has been added, all bearing on Bible reading, Bible study, &c. ; this has been done in order to give the best thoughts of some of the most prominent Bible students and Christian workers of our time, upon this most important Christian duty and privilege. These " Notes " have been gathered from various sources ; many of them have been kindly contributed by friends, and others are clippings from different religious publications, Where the authors are known their names or initials have been given. For all such favors the parties interested will please accept the thanks of the editors. This informal volume is now sent out with a prayer that the promised teaching of the Holy Spirit may attend its use, and thai through its instrumentality many may be led to the Great Teacher, many led to an entire consecration, and to a deeper and more atten- tive study of the Word of God. S. R. BR1GGS. JOHN H. ELLIOTT. " ge afcait fcnroto $t Cvuijjr, anb % totjj ajrall mate " em. BIBLE READINGS. BY D. W. WHITTLE. i st. How prepared : Select some doctrine or exhortation as to Christian living, prac- tical in the application, and exalting Christ. Among such subjects will readily occur Grace, Love, Faith, Redemption, Sanctifica- tion, the Blood, Prayer, the Two Natures, the New Birth, Work, Warfare, and so on. Take the concordance and read, with prayer, all the passages bearing upon the topic selected. Get full yourself of the truth taught. Praise God by yourself and for yourself for its preciousriess. Then, divide your topic into heads, according to its natural and logical divisions. This is the key to the preparation of an interesting, profitable, and instructive reading. The bring- ing together of passages in a jumble, selecting them because they all contain the same word, cannot interest or profit. There must be order and a development of thought in the exhortation of doc- trine for the mind to receive and profit by it. The reading below is presented as suggesting this plan, not as the best execution of it. Be careful in not making the reading too long. Better to di- vide your topic into five or si-x readings, and bring out the Scrip- tures upon each head to your own satisfaction, [than to crowd too many heads into one reading. You will find the instruction thus given more easily apprehended and more carefully retained. The fault with most of us lay workers, who have been uninstructed in logical presentation of truth, is in the beginning of our work to make our readings too cumbersome. My first Bible reading on Faith contained some sixty Scripture references. Before they were all read the audience were tired, and it was a source of anxiety and difficulty for me to interest them. That same Bible reading pre- pared for one meeting has now developed into seven, given as a course, at seven successive meetings, with seeming interest and appreciation on the part of the people, and pleasure to myself. I have used for this reading, and for others, as a matter ol convenience, the Scripture suggestion of the number seven, in making up the heads of the topics. For instance, upon Faith the order of the readings and their divisions is as follows : i st. Seven reasons for reasonableness of Faith (all Scripture texts.) and. Seven directions as to how Faith is received. 3rd. Seven things possessed by Faith. . j 8 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 4th. Seven fruits of Faith. fth. Seven trials of Faith. 6th. Seven things said of those without Faith. 7th. Seven triumphs of Faith. Two or three Scripture references are used under each head, making each reading consist of between twenty and twenty-five texts. It will, of course, be understood that this subdivision and elabo- ration is recommended only for those topics that in the nature of the case, by the wide scope of truth embraced by them, require it. More simple topics would be better treated condensed into one reading. After your Scripture texts are arranged, endeavour un- der each one of your headings to have one or more appropriate illustrations, to make clear the truth and to fasten it in the memory. 2nd. How to give Bible readings. The method should vary with the character of the audience and the circumstances and surroundings of the meeting. In a very large audience it is better to read the passages yourself, asking the audience to turn to them and all join with you in the reading. Give time for all to turn to the passages, and read slow and dis- tinct enough for all to join. Pay much attention to emphasis in reading. The proper interpretation of the text will often be revealed by proper emphasizing of the words. In a small audience, in a lecture room where persons reading in different parts of the room can be readily heard, give out your references one text to a person, if you have good readers enough, if not, two or more texts to the same person. Use slips of papei in giving out the references. Have them prepared before you go to* the meeting, and ask some one who is acquainted with the audience to distribute them to good readers as you are singing the opening hymn, or (this is far better) before you commence the exercises. It is not safe to call out references and let them be taken by volunteers. Some will have wrong passages and some will not read distinctly. The slips will also give you trouble unless the person giving them out is judicious, and makes each one who receives a slip understand that they are to read the passage promptly when called for. It is best for the leader, also, as he opens the meet- ing to distinctly explain what he expects of those who have re- ceived slips, and to request them if they do not intend to comply to pass the slip back. After calling for a reference twice, with slight interval, the leader had better read himself, not delaying the audience for those who have lost the place. Let the word stand out clear and speak for itself. Simply call attention to the obvious truth each reference presents, aud its connection and place in the subject you are developing. Have faith in the presence of the Holy Spirit as the teacher. Have con- ^dence in the power of the Word to do its own work. Be humble NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 9 in the advancement of your interpretation of the text, and always fortify your interpretation, not by quoting human authority, but the Word itself. Remember James iii. i. ' My brethren, be not many teachers, knowing that we shall receive the greater condem- nation." The less of our thought and our ideas in the reading, the more profitable it will be to us and to all. HOW TO STUDY THE BIBLE. BY REV. LYMAN ABBOTT. I. MEANS OF STUDY. In answering the question which I have epitomized in the title of this and three succeeding letters on the subject, I shall assume that you have neither the means to pur- chase a large library nor the time and opportunity to make good use of it if you had it. I shall assume that you are engaged in some form oi Bible instruction, and that you want some suggestions to aid you in getting a clear practical knowledge of the Bible yourself, which you may impart to others. For this purpose you need a library. You cannot study with- out books. But your library need not be large or expensive ; a jack- knife in skilful hands is better than a full tool-chest in the hands of A bungler. First you must have a reference Bible, and a good one. It is a matter of no mean importance to have one Bible that is good enough to last a life-time. I have one, a Bagster, that I have carried over twenty years. I can turn to a book, a chapter, or a text with celerity, for I have learned to know the verses by their locali- ties ; in another Bible I might ransack the pages for the missing verse in vain. Buy your Bible in flexible binding. It costs more but it never wears out. Next to a reference Bible is a Bible Text-book and a Concord- ance ; the Text-Book is more important than the Concordance as well as cheaper. The difference between a Text-book and a Con- cordance is that the former gives you references to Scripture teach- ing according to subjects, while the latter gives a classification of all Scripture texts according to words. Thus, if you look in your Concordance for the word " atonement" you will find only one verse referred to, for the word only occurs once in the New Testa- ment ; but if you look in your Text-Book you will find many references, for the New Testament is full of the doctrine. The use of a Concordance is to find a given text, one important word of which you know ; the use of the Text-Book is to find a collection of Bible texts on any given theme, not one of which you may have known before. Next to the Text-Book and Concordance, which are simply contrivances for finding out what is in the Bible, comes a good Bible Dictionary. The object of this is to give a knowledge of bib- lical geography and antiquities, without which much that is in the 10 NOTES FOR BIBLE READING!-. Bible is but imperfectly intelligible. For scholars who want to study the conflicting themes and opinions of learned men there is nothing so good as the American edition of Smith's Bib'e Diction- ary, in four voulmes. But he who has not acquired some practical skill in the balancing pros and cons is liable to get lo*t in the labyrinthine discussions of this scholarly work. For such, a " Dic- tionary of Religious Knowledge" is published by Harper & Brothers which aims to include both all biblical subjects and all impor- tant theological and ecclesiastical topics. Of that, since I was its chief editor, I shall not say anything more than that it was pre- pared with especial view to the wants of those biblical students who desire a volume to give them the results without the processes of scholarship. Next to a Bible Dictionary is a good Commentary on the Bible. I know a great many persons express a contempt for commenta- ries, and as commentaries are often used the contempt is natu- ral ; only it is deserved by the use, not by the book. The com- mentary is not a book to be studied, it is a book to help you study the Bible. Knives and forks are better than fingers for the purpose of eating ; but the man who should attempt to eat knives and forks would have a sorry meal. Study the Bible ; let a good commentary help you in your study. It will give you the best reading when there are variations. It will give you the meaning of the original when the English version is inadequate. It will give you light on manners and customs when they are needed as interpreters. It will give you the connection with the context and light from parallel passages when the meaning is obscure. It will indicate to you the spiritual purpose of the writer and of the Spirit of God in the writer, and it will give you the best suggestive thoughts of the best thinkers, or some of them, respecting the meaning and use of the passage. It is the very folly of self-conceit to assume, as some of the critics of the commentaries do, that any man can pick up his Bible, and in half an hour read as much in a verse or a chapter, without aid, as he can after a conference with the most devout and scholarly thinkers who have spent days and weeks in the reverent study of the same book and perhaps the identical passage under consideration. Finally you need to complete your library, a blank-book in which io enter the results of your study. I do not advise any sys- tem of Bible-marking. Keep your Bible clean to express to you God's thoughts, not to serve as a journal, or a diary of your own. The best blank-book for library purposes is an interleaved Bible : the best for use in the class is a little blank-book to be carried in the pocket ; better than either is a combination ; a small blank- book to jot down the thought at the moment to serve as the merchant's day-book and an Index Rerum or an interleaved Bible into which these thoughts are transferred from time to time to serve as the merchant's journal and ledger. One other means of study is as important as a library that is time. If you will select half an hour the morning half hour is NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. II the best, in my judgment for regular and systematic study of the Word of God, though each day you will do but little, you will be surprised to find how much you have learned in the course of the year. The tortoise still beats the hare in the race. 2nd. Methods : Turn a college student adrift in the Astor Library or the Con- gressional Library, and though he might enjoy himself in a de- sultory way in mousing among the books he would come out at the end of the day little wiser than he went in. He should first ask, How is the library arranged ? Where are the historical alcoves ? Where is the philosophy ? Where the belles-lettres? Fitful dashes at the Bible the Psalms to-day, the Epistles to-morrow, Exodus the day after give a man about as much knowledge of the Bible as a child gets of Botany who goes gathering wild flowers in the woods in May. A study of the Bible 1 as a whole is a necessary preliminary. What is the Bible ? It is a library. How long was it in process of evolution or creation, if that is a more orthodox word ? About sixteen hundred years. Of what does it consist ? Laws, political economy, history, poetry, biography, fiction, theology. How do you divide it ? The first five books of the Old Testament are laws and political economy ; the next twelve books are history ; the rest are poetry and prophecy. The first four books of the New Testament are biography ; the next one is history ; the rest, ex- cept Revelation, are theology and philosophy, but always writ- ten for a practical purpose and with a practical application. The last book is a poem, a picture, a drama. This short catechism indicates what I mean by the study of the Bible as a whole. This gives the outlines of the structure. Some knowledge of authors, their times, their civilization, their purpose in writing, the characteristics oi Jewish laws, of ancient history, of Hebrew poetry are equally necessary. Any good Bible Dictionary, any good Commentary, will give you more or less material for such preliminary study. In connection with many Sunday-schools are Normal Classes to pursue such courses of study. They ought to be more numerous than they are. The study of individual books is a secondary preliminary. How many of even tolerably well educated Sunday-school teachers have any idea of the significance and purpose and character of single books of the Bible Leviticus, Ruth, Job, Ecclesiastes ! How many know any generic difference between the Epistle to the Philippians and that to the Galatians ? We read the Bible as Jack Horner ate his Christmas pudding pick out the plums and sometimes with the same result ; when we are through our morning chapter we take our reward in a sweet sense of self-satis- faction, " What a good boy am I ! " Let me illustrate what I mean by the study of individual books. The scholar has read verses and chapters from the book of Job. He has heard repeatedly quoted, " Oh'that mine adversary had written a book !" He has no idea what it means, for the quotation 12 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. is always semi-jocular. He takes up the book of Job to study it. What is it ? A poem, a parable, a story whether fiction founded on fact or fiction without any fact-foundation is not very material, it is certainly as true as the parable of the prodigal son, and that is true enough. Who was Job ? A man who lived in the world's twilight. No " Sun of Righteousness" had risen on him. He never refers to law, or priest, or prophet, or dream, or divine revelation of any kind. He was a worshipper of a true but a wholly unknown God. He was a Hebrew Socrates. His religion was the "religion of nature." If it be said that he possessed in ad- dition that knowledge of God which had trickled down through tradition from the patriarchal age, it may be replied that every devout heathen has possessed the same knowledge. He lived in the faith of the aphorism, Be virtuous and you will be happy. So long as he was prosperous his " religion of nature" stood him in good stead. But adversity came. His property was swept away ; his children were killed ; disease laid hold on him ; nothing was left but his wile, and she was almost the direst misfortune of all. He was utterly overwhelmed ; was in hopeless perplexity. The very foundations of his faith were broken up. His three friends insisted on it that all this was a punishment for his sins. He was too good a man to play at mock humility, and indignantly denied it. He maintained his virtue, and yet he could not 've up his faith in God ; so his perplexity embittered his grief, ut of it comes the cry for just that which the divine revelation gives to us in our sorrow. " Oh for a Daysman ! Oh for a divine disclosure of the unknown ! Oh that this divine Enemy who has suffered blow on blow to fall upon me had written a book to explain his ways and reveal his will ! " Natural religion fails in great sorrow. Then the soul wants a Saviour ; wants a Bible. When the student has gotten this general view of the book of Job, as a parabolic poem teaching the need of a supernatural Christianity, all in the book, every cry oi Job, every super- cilious consolation offered by his three miscalled friends, becomes significant. No man can understand a part that does not under- stand the whole. He that would interpret aright a single flower in the tapestry must first stand off a little and get a view of the whole pattern. " Vanity of vanities; all is vanity." It is not true, all is not vanity. This world is God's university. It is magnificently endowed. As a training-school for another life beyond it is ad- mirable. No man can read aright the book of Ecclesiastes who does not consider it as the experience of a man who had not taken this world as a training-school : who had sought for happiness in wealth, pleasure, riches ; who had drank life's cups and found it loam on top and dregs at the bottom. " Vanity of van- ities ; all is vanity" is not the Christian verdict ; it is the mis- anthrope's wail. It is the testimony ol the blase man of the world. It is true only from his point of view. The student must know the author of Ecclesiastes and his life and his purpose NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 1J before he can understand the book. -Who would interpret Childe Harold as though Cowper had written it ? The Epistle to the Philippians is the letter of thanks of a for- eign missionary box. The Epistle to the Galatians is the letter of admonition to the fickle-minded Frenchmen of the first century because their zeal of love had turned to ceremonialism. The Epistle to the Romans is a treatise on systematic theology in the form of a letter. Each must be read in the light of its origin and object. This general course of study of the structure of the whole Bible and of individual books in the Bible is preliminary to study in detail of their contents. It will give all the advantage to be gained by reading the Bible through in course. I do not advise any one to undertake such a reading. I should as soon think of attempting to read a library through, or a cyclopedia. I should almost as soon think of eating a hotel course all through, dispos- ing of all the soups in order to-day and beginning on the fish course to-morrow. The only, certainly the chief, use of such a course of reading is that thus you may get a general knowledge of the contents of the Bible, and the method of study which I have indicated is far better for that purpose. 3. MORE ABOUT METHODS. The possible ways of studying the Bible are as diverse as human minds. To lay down rules tor Bible study would be as preposterous as to lay down rules of locomotion for fish, flesh, and fowl. The first and fundamental principle is this : Let each man study the Bible in his own way. One man who is systematic will do it with regularity ; another who is moody will do it according to his moods ; one who is analytical will do it by collation and comparison of texts ; another who is not will study its historical books and its biographies ; still another will find most nutriment in its books ol poetry. Let each bee go where he gets honey. Buzzing at a flower whose honey is beyond your reach is useless. Do not take another man's method unless it fits your mind. A shepherd's sling and a smooth stone are better for David than Saul's armor. All that I shall attempt to do in this and a succeeding and a final letter will be to illustrate, from my own experience, three methods of Bible study. i. Biographical. I began a few weeks ago reading the story of Joseph at family prayers. I found that it solved very satisfac- torily the problem presented by a pastor's wife last week in her article, " Babies in prayer-time." The youngest sat in my lap, the next youngest sat in his chair by my side. I take it for granted that the older members of the family can read the Bible for themselves ; I therefore conduct family prayers for the benefit of the youngest members. As I read I explained ; substituted short words for long ones ; stopped for questions, and answered them. The episode about Potiphar's wife I omitted. I read but little at a time. The Scripture reading served as a serial story. Both the " babies in prayer-time" wanted me to read mora, 14 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. Two or three Sundays after we had completed the course I over- heard them playing church. The youngest was preaching ; and he told the whole story of Joseph with only now and then a blunder. Then the next older one corrected him. One is four years old, the other is five and a half. This is the biographical method in its simplest form. It is capable of indefinite expansion and variation. The life of David affords admirable material for a course oi study. " Townsend's Bible" or Harper's "Dictionary of Religious Knowledge" will give you the occasion of the composition of his various Psalms. Read the life ; look up the geographical refer- ences in your Bible Dictionary ; and read the Psalms in connec- tion with the experiences from which they were evolved. Psalms xlii., xliii., which are really one, have a new meaning when you read the story of anguish and bitterness out of which they sprang, like a flower watered by the springs of Marah. There is no such song in the night as this Psalm. David's declaration in Psalm iii., " I laid me down and slept," is meaningless until you know when he slept. It only indicates that he was sleepy ; men have even been known to go to sleep of a Sunday afternoon in church, and it was not imputed to them for righteousness. But consider the circumstances. He was fleeing from Jerusalem, his life threatened by his favorite son, his kingdom apparently wrested from him, some of his most trusted counsellors turned against him, desolate in the present and not knowing what was before him in the future, and then and there, on the edge of the wilder- ness, with only the sky above him for a roof, and but a tew firm friends for companions, he was able to sleep in peace. Now see in this simple declaration one of the strongest illustrations of the power of faith and trust which the Bible contains. How often that text has sung me to sleep in times when but for it I must have passed an anxious, troubled and sleepless night ! No man knows either David or his Psalms who has not read the story of his life through in chronological order, and in connection with the record- ed experiences which his life produced. The life is God's hands striking the heartstrings ; the Psalms are the music the heart gives iorth. The life ot Paul is an admirable theme for a course of biograph- ical study. And the autobiographical passages in his epistles should be studied in connection with Luke's history ; e . g., Philip- pians iii., 4-10, with Acts ix., 1-18. Any good religious dictionary or commentary will give the references. Best of all is the " Life of Christ." Mr. Beecher somewhere has given an account 01 the light borne in upon his own soul by reading through at a sitting one oi the gospels, for the purpose of getting a clear and connected idea 01 the character of Christ. That his ministry has always been so peculiarly a Christly ministry is in no small measure attributable to that one experience. A more elaborate study may easily be made by taking either a Harmony of the Gospels or one of the many lives of Christ, and then study- MOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 15 ing in detail each incident, miracle and teaching in its appropriate place, and with a consideration of its relation to Christ's whole life-work. The story of the Syro-Phenician woman has been a perplexity to many minds, simply because they did not know that Christ was off on a vacation, and that to have performed the miracle asked of him would have defeated his purpose ; did in Tact defea* it, and drove him from the rest and retirement he was seek- ing in a heathen country. It is somewhat more difficult, but not less profitable, to trace the growth of character by a comparison and collation of scattered passages ; the development of Peter from the rude and profane fisherman to the eloquent revivalist, or the development of John from the fiery disciple who would have called divine destruction down upon the Samaritan village to the gentle and loving author of John's Gospel. 2. Topical. The topical method is one of endless variety ; but the principle is always the same. The object of the student is to ascertain what is the teaching of the Bible on any given topic. The instruments are very simple. They are a reference Bible, a Bible Text-book, a Concordance ; and common sense. Last year at Chautauqua Dr. Vincent asked me to conduct an Eventide Conference on the " Peace of God." I borrowed a Bible, Text-book and a Concordance ; and I prepared four or five slips of paper, on which I wrote such questions as the following, a separate question on each slip : In what does this peace consist ? What are its characteristics Who can attain it ? How can it be attained ? How is it lost ? Then I took my Bagster Bible and my wife took the Con- cordance, and together we looked for the Bible answers to these questions. She read to me from the Concordance every text that contained the word " peace ; " I looked them up in the Bible and put the answers which they gave me in their appropriate places on my memoranda. Thus, " Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee " went down on two memoranda : under "characteristics of peace" I wrote perfect; under "how attained " I wrote by trust in God. The text, " The peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds tiirough Christ Jesus," three times. This is a guardian peace ; it is too deep for intellectual analysis ; and it is given through faith in jfestis Christ. So we went through the Concordance ; then we went through the Bible Text Books, which gave us additional texts that did not contain the word peace ; such as that promise in Isaiah, " When thou passest through the waters I will be with thee, and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee," and such as that invitation in Matthew, " Come unto Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." The result of three or four hours of such study was a series of answers some- 16 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. thing like the following ; I am writing from memory without my notes before me. The peace of God is (i) God's own peace, the peace that be longs to the divine nature ; (2) it therefore belongs to the children of God just in the measure in which they become partakers of the divine nature. (3) It is deep, perfect, everlasting. (4) It is peace from the burden and curse of sin. (5) It is peace in all times of sorrow and trouble. (6^) It is given by God through faith in Jesus Christ. (7) The conditions of receiving it are consecration to God and trust in God. (8) The lack of peace always indicates either imperfect consecration or imperfect trust. This account may serve to illustrate what I mean by the topical study of the Bible. The varieties in method are endless, as the reader will at once perceive. It requires no great scholarship to pursue such a study. And I believe that if the ministry generally would search through the Bible in this way for its answers to their questions, instead of going to their Calvin's and their Watson's Institutes, their sermons on theological points and theology is of all themes the one of the greatest popular interest would be more original, more striking, more authoritative, and more potent in their direct practical and spiritual appeal to the hearts, and con- sciences of hearers. 4. STUDYING THE SUNDAY-SCHOOL LESSON. Paul has told us what the Bible is good for. It is profitable for doctrine i. e. t for .religious instruction. And then he specifies the particulars : for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness ; that is, it is useful to convince men of their sins, to set them on the road to reform, and to instruct them on questions of right and wrong when they have started out on that road. The Bible is a tool, and this is the work that is to be done with it. Now, in using any tool, the first and instinctive question of a good workman is, What am I to do with this tool at this time ? The chisel in the hand of a carpenter is not one tool, but many ; and he always, though not always consciously, considers what he means to do with it before he begins his work ; and of all his various chisels he selects that particular one which is best fitted for his purpose. The first question you, as a Sunday-school teacher, are to ask yourself the first question that your pastor ought to ask himself in preparing his sermon, is this : What am I going to do with this Scripture ? Am I going to use it to convince my scholars of their sins and their need of a Saviour, or to awaken in them a resolu- tion of repentance and reformation, or to instruct them in the right way assuming that they already want to walk in it ; or am I to use it in all these ways according to my scholars' characters and dispositions ? And again : Am I to use it to convince generally of sin, or of some particular sin ; to lead generally to repentance and reform- ation, or to a resolution of reform in some particular ? To get the answer to these questions, take first your Bible and the golden text, which you will generally find useful because it NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 17 represents what some able Bible scholars think to be the use of the particular Scripture before you. Study these before you look at the " Lesson Helps." Fix firmly in your mind what you think to be the use of that lesson to you in your class, no matter what some one else could find in it for a different class of minds. For you, in a Bible class, are not to use it as your companion in Christ is to use it in the infant class. The answer to these ques- tions is something that no one else can give to you. It must simply come from much and prayerful pondering of the text itself. Sometimes it will flash upon you on the first reading ; sometimes it requires a long pondering to arrive at a result. But whenever this result is arrived at, half your work, and the best half, is done. Next, with this aim clearly before you, and I think that it is often an advantage to write it down to give clearness to your own mind, begin your study of the details. Study these as far as they will help you to accomplish your object. Your lesson is the folly of Rehoboam. It is small matter whether he got his name from his father prophetically or whether it was subsequently given to him in derision by the people. Do not waste much time over that. Your lesson is the conversion of Paul. You are going to use it in an endeavour to bring some of your hesitating, procras- tinating pupils to a final decision. Do not waste time in deciding which o( the three routes Paul probably took to Damascus. Your lesion is Elijah by the brook Cherith. You have a skeptic in your r lass, and you determine to use this lesson to show the reality oi the miracles in the Old Testament. Then you need to know whether the ravens were really ravens, or were, as some scholars contend, merchants ; but if you are going to use the lesson to confirm faith in the Providential care of God over all those who trust in him, it is a matter of small or no account whether ne used merchants or ravens for this purpose. So your pre-detei mined use of the lesson will determine the nature of your sub: equent studies. When you have thus laid out your lesson in your own mind considered the questions most likely to arise and most important to be answered, and perhaps put your thoughts down in a note- book, you may advantageously take up your lesson helps ; but in general they should not be taken up before. They should be " helps " to an independent study of the Bible, not a substitute for it. Not till this preliminary work is done are you ready to get the full benefit of the thoughts of others, which you are otherwise liable to substitute for your own. They must become your own before you can make the best use of them ; but for this purpose they must be engrafted on your own stock, filtered through your own brain. You must be a fruit-tree, not a barrel of plucked apples ; a spring, not a cistern. Finally, of all helps the Bible is the best. That is, in deter- mining what is the meaning of any teaching or the use of any incident, find out if you can what use the sacred writers have 2 l8 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. made of it themselves, or what truth contained in it is elsewhere illustrated or enforced by other parallel teachings of Scripture. Let me interpret and illustrate these principles by their use in the latest lesson that I have studied the one in this week's paper. I first turn to my Bible and read the passage, i Kings xvii. i- 1 6. Why was this story told ? What lesson has it forme? For if I can apply it to myself I can, with power such as is only derived from personal experience, apply it to others. I see in it a threefold trial of courage : first, the courage of work ; second, the courage of patience ; third, the courage of charity. This lies on the surface. Are there other lessons ? Yes, there are two that the Lord himself drew from this incident, one in Luke iv. 25-26 ; the other in Matt. x. 41, 42. The ground of courage, the Lord's provision for his own, is there also : a more beautiful illus- tration of the principle that Jesus taught in the Sermon on the Mount, Matt. vi. 26, I know not where you will find. This is the use I will make of it ; to inculcate a stronger courage, a broader charity, a more hopeful trust. Then come the questions, Where was the brook Cherith ? Why did God employ ravens ? Where was Zarephath ? What were the peculiarities of an Eastern famine, etc.? If the ascertainable answers to these questions aid in accomplishing my object I study them ; if they do not I pass them by without an answer. Then follows the use of the work oi previous writers in the same field Stanley, Robinson, Taylor, Keil, Maurice, etc. from whom I gleam but do not reap. These are the outlines ; the varieties in method are endless Sometimes the lesson calls for but little extra- Biblical study , sometimes it requires a great deal ; ordinarily, study of the Bible comes first, " helps" afterwards ; but sometimes the study of geography, or customs, or seemingly secondary questions, must precede the determination of the question, What use shall I make of this Scripture ? Thus, in order to understand the meaning of the fire test between Elijah and the priests of Baal, it is necessary to know something more about Baal than is disclosed in the Bible, at least on a mere reading of it. But however he may vary in his method and he will never study two lessons exactly alike, and no two teachers will study the same lesson exactly in the same manner he must always study it with the same object kept steadily in view ; the moral and spiritual benefit, first, of himself, and, second, of his class. Not he who is the most learned, or the most polished, or the most eloquent, but he who is most " apt to teach " is the best teacher. And he who most constantly keeps in view the great fact that the lesson is but an instrument, that his real object is the development of Christian disposition and character in his scholars, that all Scripture is profitable for this purpose, is the one 44 most apt to teach." HOW TO STUDY THE BIBLE. SYNOPSIS OF AN ADDRESS BY W. J. ERDMAN, CHICAGO. There are two books of God Nature and the Bible. Creation and redemption are the two works of God, and the works are words, John xiv. 10. Both Creation and Redemption lead to faith in God, John iii. 12: iii. 31 ; Luke xii. 22-28 ; Psalm cxix. 64; Rom. x. 17-18. Both should be studied in the same way. li it seems surprising to discuss the methods of Bible study at so late a day after it has been in the hands of men for hundreds of years, let .us remember the marvellous discoveries of natural science fall within the last two centuries, and are due to a change ot the methods of investigation. Have we studied the Bible as scientists now investigate nature ? Science creates no new facts, theology no truths ; all is finished for man to search out. How shall he search out the work oi Creation and the work of Redemp- tion ? i. The sbirit in which to study is that of a child. Lord Bacon said, " one mu>t enter the kingdom of the natural sciences as one enters the kingdom of heaven, like a little child." A child is humble, trustful, docile, without prepossessions, theories or fixed opinions. The world before it is like to an Adam new and fresh. If a botanist finds a strange flower, he lets the flower tell him what it is ; he has neither knowledge or name for it ; what it is, becomes, or rather is its name ; if a mineralogist meets a strange stone he asks it questions, and puts into a stone only what he first gets out ; in like manner a Bible student must wait on a verse or text or epistle or any book or part thereof to tell him what it is. Many readers get out of a verse just what they first put in, and that may be all of man's wisdom and not at all the mind of God. We must go to the word of God therefore with the humil- ity, simplicity, and receptivity of a little child. But the question is also what kind of a child ; and the answer is a child of God ; and if a child of God, then must the Spirit of God be the Light in which to study the words and works of God. The written word is like the word made flesh, divine and human, and it must be studied with the light of the divine Spirit in the human. God alone can show God. This is the axiom in the study of the two books, God is : Heb. xi. 6 ; but more needful to study truly is it to know not only that God is, but that He is the Father, and the student and reader His child. The " natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God," whether revealed in the Bible or in nature, for the flower and the Cross teach the same lesson, trust in God ; but scientists rarely read the lessons from off the lily and the bird which Jesus lull of the Spirit of God read, Luke xii. 22-28; i Cor. ix. 10; Ps. cxix. 18 ; Amos iv. 13 ; John i. 1-3 ; i. 14; i. 18; iii. 16-18. 20 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. God's word is thus written for His children and must be receiv- ed humbly and reverently and eagerly, and in the absolute faith in which a child takes the word of his father. Always then take for granted that God is. Never try to prove it. It is Father's book. He wrote it Himself. He wrote it for us. Believe every word of it, or we shall never get the good of it. Men think prophecy is a dark subject, and the only use of it is to prove that God knew something beforehand, and that he has not lied to us. Prophecy is to teach God's children His purposes. A person may think he knows all about the Bible because he has read it through six or seven times. But this may be mere surface work. I may go through a country on an express train several times, and still know nothing of it. To walk through it and get ac- quainted with its stones and trees and flowers and dells and streams and to love it as all my own, is a very different matter. We must love the word and not only for our sake, but for His sake who is in it. Reading it through and through will do no good, unless we love it and see into it as a lover of nature sees into the woods and stones. In brief it must be searched in sim- plicity, with colorless desire to be taught ; with earnest quest, as men seek fora knowledge of nature; in the receptive, humbie, reverent faith of a child, with the attention and intentness that shall let nothing escape notice ; with the love and appropriation with which a child reads his own father's letter for himself, and abjve all, with the dependence upon and illumination of the Spirit of God which leads one to unlock every Scripture with the key of filial expectant prayer. Such is the way in which we should study the word of God. II. The method of study is the inductive. All the parts to jot and tittle must first be gathered together before a conclusion is stated or a name given. The stones of one kind must all be brought together however varied their forms, and the flowers classified though scattered through many parts and climes. Ecc. iii. n ; Ps. xl. 5 ; xix. 1-6. Take a concordance and find a word run it through the Bible. Take for instance, glory, glorified. You will find in it a wonder- ful line of thought. The cloud of glory is associated with it. In that cloud is wrapped both the blessing and the wrath of God. Study by phrases. Separate them. See how they are used. Get their meaning in every context. Find out their exact force and colour. Such study will bring to light resemblances and differences, types and antitypes, shadows and body, times and seasons, peoples and dispensations, the eternal purpose, the varied pre- paration, and the final fulfilment. Such method is self-interpreting, light is seen in light, Ps. xxxvi. 9 ; cxix. 6 ; and the conclusions reached become in turn keys and openings to further knowledge. The Bible is a living growth. Its structure is mathematical like the universe, and its numbers are symbolic. It is photographic and so microscopic* NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 21 The thought is one like the mind : one yet manifold through ages of revelation. It is timeless as one thought from the beginning, and so can have no contradictions ; and when finished and ful- filled all its seeming contradictions will be known as the parts of a vast, far-reaching harmony. The Old Testament is found in the New and the New in the Old, i Cor. x. u ; Rom. v. 12-19 ; Eph. v. 32 ; Gal. iv. 21-31 ; i Pet. iii. 21 ; Gen. i. 3 ; 2 Cor. iv. 6. III. The instruments, means, and helps may be briefly stated in the order of their nearness to any one : i. A Reference Bible. 2. A Text-Book. 3. A Bible Diction- ary. 4. A Concordance. 5. A Translation. 6. An English- man's Greek Concordance. 7. A Commentary. Never consult a Commentary on any doctrine in cold blood ; think, study, search first yourself. IV. The result of such study is life, love, worship, likeness. One leads to the other, John xvii. 3 ; i. 1-4 ; i John iv. 7-8 , Rom. -ii. 32-36 ; xii. 1-2 ; John iv. 20-24 5 2 Cor. iii. 18. Frjm The Truth. HOW TO STUDY THE BIBLE. First. There must be a profound conviction of the truth that "ALL Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof (or evidence, as the word is rendered in Heb. xi. i), ior correction, for instruction in righteousness," (2 Tim. iii. 16) ; " For the prophecy came not in old time (or, as the margin has it, at any time) by the will of man : but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost," (2 Pet. i.2i) ; " For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of man, but, as it is in truth, the word 01 God," (i Thess. ii. 13.) Similar testimony in a more or less direct and positive form might be cited rrom hundreds ol passages, ior the whole Bible proceeds upon the assumption, so apparent even to the casual reader, that it is the voice of God speaking through men unto men. It is obvious, therefore, that each little word, as of, the, in, from, to, which we are so apt to overlook in human writings, is worthy of particular and devout attention. It is true that unim- portant errors may have crept into this and that version or trans- lation, but when competent scholarship conducts us to the words the Holy Ghost really used, we are to consider every one of these as having its own definite place and meaning in the book of God. Hence it is never proper in quoting Scripture to give what we may suppose to be its sense, but we should see to it that the very language of revelation is presented to the minutest particle. Second. All Scripture is designed to lead us to Christ. "Search the scriptures," He said to the Jews, and of course He referred to the Old Testament scriptures ; " for in them ye think ye have 22 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. eternal life: and they are they which testify of me," (John v. 39). He does not say that some of the Scriptures merely, but all of them, testify of Him. " Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me : for he wrote of me,") John v. 46 ; " And beginning at Moses, and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself," (Luke xxiv. 27). He began at Moses, and not only at some, but all the prophets, and expounded unto them not simply in some, but in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. " These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets and in the psalms, concerning me," (Luke xxiv. 44). These were the three great divisions of the Old Testament, and our Lord declares that all were written concerning Him. It is not strange, therefore, that Paul could persuade his countrymen " concerning Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and out of the prophets, from morning till evening," (Acts xxviii. 23). From all this it is clear that if we read a chapter in the Old Testament, and do not see Christ there, we must go back and read it again, for we have not found the key to its true meaning. Out of the innumerable events that occurred during nearly four thousand years in the history of nations and families and indi- viduals, it pleased the Holy Ghost to collect and record only those that bore in the way of type or illustration upon the person and work of God's promised Son. This must be admitted at once by those who will take the trouble to compare the quotations Irom the Old Testament applied to Christ in the New, that very often at least as they originally appear do not seem to have the slightest reference to our Saviour. If, therefore, some in the early Church, and in the days of the Reformation carried their search after types to a dangerous extreme, the modern Church exhibits a tendency to a far more dangerous extreme, in the opposite direction, by failing to see that all the narratives, and offerings, and feasts, and predictions of the Old Testament centre about the cross and crown of Jesus. Third. We must study the Bible with the full persuasion that we have to do personally with all it contains. " Whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope," (Rom. xv. 4). The inspired apostle, after enumerating a number of events that occurred in the history of the Israelites, says, " Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples, (or types, as it is in the margin) ; and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come," (i Cor. x. n). We can not, then, read the Old Testament as we read the history of some ancient nation, with a feeling that it is all past, and that it possesses no interest for ourselves ; but it has a present value, speaking not less earnestly to our souls than it did to those who lived and died thousands of years before we were born. The abiding presence oi the Holy Ghost in the Scriptures NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 23 secures for them all the authority and potency ol an immediate revelation addressed directly to every reader. Fourth. It is almost needless to add that the Bible must to studied with a deep sense of our entire dependence for light and guidance upon the Spirit of God. " The natural man," or the flesh, or the Adam nature in a believer, is just as ignorant and helpless and perverted as the same nature in an unbeliever, and it is as true of the natural man in the former as in the latter that he " receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God : for they are foolishness unto him : neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned," (i Cor. ii. 14). But it is comforting to hear our Lord saying concerning this Spirit to His followers, " He shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you," (John xiv. 26). Again He says in words we should never forget in connection vith the work 01 the Spirit, " He shall testify of ME,"(Jo hn xv. 26.) J. H. B. HOW TO STUDY THE BIBLE. BY D. L. MOODY. " And all the people gathered themselves together as one man into the street that was before the water-gate ; and they spake unto Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded to Israel. And Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation both of men and women, and all that could hear with understanding, upon the first day of the seventh month. And he read therein before the street that was before the water-gate from morning until mid-day, before the men and the women, and those that could understand ; and the ears of all the people were attentive unto the book of the law." Nehemiah viii. 1-3^ The children of Israel had been in captivity for seventy years, and now they had come back into their own land; and the description given in these verses is what we should call a Bible- reading ; just getting the people together and reading the Word of the Lord to them. And perhaps it would be a good thing if we could have more meetings where the Word of God is read and explained. It is better to hear God rather than man, and I be- lieve we are living in a day when the Bible is neglected, although we are living in a land of Bibles. The children of Israel had been in a strange land, and God wished them to understand His law. It says that they were attentive to the law ; that is to say, they were just leaning for- ward and drinking in the words that were read to them. You have sometimes seen a nest of birds, and the mother comes with a little worm to ieed them, and in an instant every mouth is wide open ; and in like manner every one of us ought to have our ears wide open to catch the meaning of the Word of God when it is read to us, and if there is anything we don't understand we ought to go to the minister and have an enquiry meeting with him, and ask him to explain it to us. 24 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. We read in the ninth verse, " For all the people wept when they heard the words of the law. Then he said unto them, Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared : for this day is holy unto the Lord ; neither be ye sorry ; for the joy of the Lord is your strength." What we want, now-a-days, brethren is a joyful church. If we are in Babylon, with our harps hanging on the willow trees and our heads bowed down, we are not likely to succeed in winning souls to Christ. No ; it is when we are back again on the resurrection ground that we may hope to succeed in that. A backsliding church is a nuisance in the world. It is just a stumbling-block, and nothing more. In the seventeenth verse we read, " And all the congregation of them that were come again out of the captivity made booths, and sat under the booths ; for since the days of Joshua the son of Nun unto that day had not the children of Israel done so. And there was very great gladness." And there always will be great gladness when a backsliding people come back to God. THE WORD OF GOD IN THE HEART. When the Israelites were going into Babylon, trodden down by their oppressors and led away into a foreign land, we read in Jeremiah xx. 9. " Then I said, I will not make mention oi Him, nor speak any more in His name : but His word was in my heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forebearing, and I could not stay." Yes, it is a good thing to have the Word of God in our hearts, so that it just burns within us, and we cannot hold our peace. When the Psalmist said it was hidden in his heart, some one has remarked that it was a good thing in a good place, for a good purpose. We want the Word to burn right down into our souls ; then a man cannot restrain himself, it begins to burn, so that it would actually burn him up if he held his peace and did not speak out. " Is not my Word like as a fire, saith the Lord, and like a hammer that breaketh a rock in pieces ?" The Word of God is the sword of the Spirit, and if you young converts want to be used of God you must feed on His word. Your experience may be very good and very profitable at the outset, and you may help others by telling it to them ; but if you keep on doing nothing else but telling your experience, it will soon become stale and un- profitable, and people will weary of hearing the same thing over and over again. But when you have told how you have been converted, the next thing is to feed on the Word. We are not fountains ourselves, but the Word of God is the fountain. And ii we feed on the Word, it will be so easy then to speak to others ; and not only that, but we shall be growing all the while in grace, and others will take notice of our walk and conversation. Now, I never saw a useful Christian who was not a student o* the Bible. If a man neglects his Bible, he may pray and ask God to use him in his work, but God cannot make use of him ; for there is not much for the Holy Ghost to work upon. We must have the Word itself, which is sharper than any two-edged sword, NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 2$ Now, if you read the sermon spoken by Moses before he left the children of Israel, you will find it was just a rehearsal of what Gc r .\ had done for them, and of their deliverance from the crueJ hands ol Pharaoh ; of the destruction of their enemies in the Red Sea, and their safe conduct through the wilderness ; and yet I do not suppose there was a boy in the camp who could not have told it ten times over. And you will find that Joshua did the same ; and when Peter stood up on the day of Pentecost, the Spirit of the Lord was in him, and he went on quoting Scripture to the people, and that was the arrow that went down into* their souls. Then, again, what did the devout and martyred Stephen do but just rehearse and expound the Scriptures irom the time of Abraham downwards ? VICTORY BY THE WORD. People are constantly saying, We want something new ; some new doctrine, some new idea. Depend upon it, my friends, if you get tired of the Word oi God, and it becomes wearisome to you you are out oi communion with Him. What you want is some one who will unfold and expound the Scriptures to you. We cannot overcome Satan with our ieelings The reason why some people have such bitter experience is, they try to overcome the devil by their feelings and experiences. Christ overcame Satan by the Word. He simply said : " It is written ;'' and a second time, " It is written ;" and Satan came again and tried to misquote the Scripture, but Christ said again, " It is written," and that was the arrow that shot right into him, and drove him away. The devil does not care a bit about our Aeelings. He can play on our ieelings just as a man can on a harp. He can make our Ieelings good or bad ; he can take us up on the mountain or down into the valley ; and we can only vanquish him by the Word, which is the sword ot the Spirit. And then bear in mind there is no situation in life for which you cannot find some word of consolation in Scripture. It you are in affliction there is a promise for you ; if you are in adversity and trial, there is a promise for you : in ioy and sorrow, in health and in sickness, in poverty or in riches, in every condition ol life, God has a promise stored up in His Word lor you. THREE BOOKS EVERY CHRISTIAN SHOULD HAVE. I can imagine some persons asking, How can I get to be in love with the Bible ? Well, if you will only rouse yourselves to the study of it, and ask God's assistance, He will assuredly help you. There are three books which 1 think every Christian ought to possess. The first, of course, is the Bible. I believe in getting a good Bible, with a good plain print. I have not much love tor those little Bibles you have to hold up right under your nose to read the print ; and ii the church happens to be a little dark you cannot see the print : but it becomes a mere jumble oi words. Yes, but some of you say you cannot carry a big Bible in your pocket. Very well, then carry it under your arm ; and if you have to walk five miles you will just be preaching a sermon five miles long. I have known a man convicted by seeing another carrying his Bible under his arir. 26 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. You are not ashamed to carry hymn-books and prayer-books, and the Bible is worth all the hymn-books and prayer-books in the world put together. And if you get a good Bible you are likely to take better care of it. Suppose you pay thirty shillings ior a good Bible, the older you grow the more precious it will become to you. But be sure you don't get one so good that you will be afraid to mark it. The next I would advise you to get Cruden's Concordance, and a " Scripture text-book," not a " Birthday text- book." These books will help you study the Word ot God with profit. If you have not got them, get them to morrow, for every Christian ought to have them. STUDY TOPICALLY. Then I find one oi the best ways to study the Scriptures is to study them topically. I used at one time to read so many chapters a day, and it I did not, I thought I was getting cold and backsliding ; but mind you, if a man had asked me two hours afterwards what I had read I could not tell him. I had forgotten it nearly all. When I was a boy I used, among other things, to hoe turnips on a farm, and I used to hoe them so badly, to get over so much ground, that at night I had to put down a stick in the ground so as to know next morning where I had left off. That was somewhat in the same fashion as running through so many chapters every day. A man will say : '* Wife, did I read that chapter ?" " Well," says she, " I don't remember," and neither of them can recollect, and perhaps he reads the same chapter over and over again ; and they call that studying the Bible. I don't think there is a book in the world we neglect so much as the Bible. Merely reading the Bible is no use at all without we study it thoroughly, and hunt it through as it were for some great truth. If a friend were to see me searching about this building, and were to come up and say, " Moody, what are you looking for? have you lost something?" and I were to say, " No, I haven't lost anything, I'm not looking lor anything par- ticular," I fancy he would just let me go on by myself, and think me very foolish. But if I were to say, " Yes, I have lost a sov- ereign," why, then, I might expect him to help me to find it. Read the Bible, my friends, as if you were seeking for something of value. It is a good deal better to take a single chapter and spend a month on it, than to read the Bible at random for a month. WORK OUT SUBJECTS. I find some people now and then who boast that they have read the Bible through in so many months. Others read the Bible chapter by chapter, and get through it in a year ; but I think it would be almost better to spend a year over one chapter. If I were going into a court of justice, and wanted to carry the jury with me, I would get every witness I could to ^stify to the one point on which I wanted to convince the jury. I would not get them to testify everything, but just on that one thing ; and so it should be with the Scriptures. I look up that word " love," and I don't know how many weeks I spent in study- ing the passages in which it occurs, till at last I couldn't help loving peop A e. I had been leedmg so long on love that I was NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. VJ anxious to do everybody good that I came in contact with. Take up grace, take up iaith, take up assurance. Some people say, I don't believe in assurance. I never knew anybody who read their Bible but believed in assurance. This book teaches nothing else. Paul says " I know in whom I have believed." Job says " I know that my Redeemer liveth." It is not, " I hope, I trust." The best book on assurance was written by one called " John," at the back part of the Bible. He wrote an epistle on assurance. Sometimes you just get a word that will be a sort of key to the epistle, and which unfolds it. Now, if you turn to John xx. 31, you will find it says " These are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God ; and that believing ye might have life through his name." Then if you turn to I John v. 13 you will read thus : " These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God ; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God." That whole epistle is written on assurance. I have no doubt John had found some people who doubted about assurance, and doubted whether they were saved or not, and he takes up his pen and says, " I will settle that question ;" and he writes that last verse in the twentieth chapter of his gospel. I have heard some people say it was not their privilege to know that they were saved ; they had heard the minister say that no one could know whether they were saved or not, and they took what the minister said instead of what the Word of God said. Others read the Bible to make it fit in and prove their favourite creed or notions, and it it did not do so they would not read it. It has been well said, that they must not read the Bible by the blue light of Presbyterianism, nor the red light of Methodism, nor the violet light of Episcopalianism,butbythe light of the Spirit of God. Now, if you will ju',t take up your Bible and study assurance for a week you will soon see it is your privilege to know that you are a child of God. FEED ON THE PROMISES. Then take another thing the pro- mises of God. Let a man feed for a month on the promises of God, and he will not be talking about how poor he is. You hear people say " Oh, my leanness ! how lean I am !" My friends, it is not their leanness, it is their laziness. If you would only go from Genesis to Revelation, and see all the promises made by God to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to the Jews and the Gentiles, and to all his people everywhere ; if you were to spend a month feeding on the precious promises of God, you wouldn't be going about with your heads hanging down like bulrushes, com- plaining how poor you are ; but you would lift up your heads with confidence, and proclaim the riches of His grace, because you couldn't help it. After the Chicago fire a man came up to me and said in a sympathising tone, " I understand you lost every- thing, Moody, in the Chicago fire." " Well, then," said I, " some one has misinformed you." " Indeed ! Why I was certainly told you had lost all." " No ; its a mistake," I said, "quite a mistake." 28 NOTES FOR BIBLE READINGS. 44 Have you got much left then ?" asked my friend. " Yes," I replied, ' I have g->t much more left than I lost, though I cannot tell how much I have lost." "Well, I am glad of it, Moody; I did not know you were that rich before the fire." " Yes," said I, " I am a good deal richer than you could conceive ; and h