friends in the church and congregation. In the evening, at seven o'clock, a public meeting was held, when congratulatory and important addresses were delivered by the Revs. T. Morris, Wm. Thorn. S. S. Pugh, and Francis Wills, the pastor in the chair. HULL. An interesting service was held in Great George-street chapel, Hull, on the evening of April 13th. to recognise the Rev. R. Hall, B. A, late of Arlington, as pastor of the church assembling in that place of worship. Mr. Hall commenced the proceedings by an interesting statement of his faith, and of his reasons for entering the ministry, as well as for accepting his present pastorate. The Rev. B. Evans then addressed Mr. Hall very suitably on the characteristics of the christian ministry. The Rev. A. M. Stalker, of Leeds, gave an impressive and appropriate address to the church. The devotional services were conducted by the Rev. Messrs. Johnston, Sibree, Redford, and Jukes. Mr. Hall commences his ministry in this place with pleasing prospects of success. WELLINGTON STREET, LUTON. On Good - Friday, the 6th of April, a highly interesting service was held in the School-room of the above place of worship, in connection with the Bible-class, when about 160 persons sat down to tea. In the course of the evening, after an appropriate address by James Waller, Esq (one of the deacons), the pastor of the church was presented with an elegant silver inkstand, bearing the following inscription:- Presented to the Rev. James Harcourt, as a token of affection from the members of his Btble-class, April 6th, 1855." Several other addresses were delivered by different members of the church. REGENT'S PARK CHAPEL, LONDON. It has been announced that this chapel, which has been remodelled from the Diorama by Sir S. M. Peto, is to be opened to-day. The Rev. W. Brock preaches in the morning, and the Rev. S. Martin in the evening. The Rev. W. Landels, the minister of the chapel, will preach on Lord's-day, May 6th. Obituary. W. B. GURNEY, ESQ. We deeply regret to have to announce the death of W. B. Gurney, Esq, the highly esteemed senior treasurer of the Baptist Missionary Society, which took place at his residence, Denmark Hill, Surrey, on Sunday morning, March 25th, at half past six o'clock. in the seventyeighth year of his age. For some time past Mr. Gurney's infirmities have been increasing but no serious apprehensions had been caused until within a few days of his death, and it was even hoped that he would be able to preside at the laying of the foundationstone of the jubilee building of the Sunday School Union, which has been fixed for the first Thursday in May. His death was therefore somewhat sudden; but in this there is no cause for sorrow: he was not unprepared. To the religious public Mr. Gurney was best known, perhaps, as treasurer of the Baptist Missionary Society. His father was a deacon of the Baptist church in Maze Pond, then under the pastoral care of the excellent Mr. Dore. It is not wonderful, therefore, that a son who had taken so much interest in the religious instruction of his poor neighbours, should, on the formation of the Baptist Missionary Society, bave thrown his energies into this branch of religious usefulness also, with so much energy as to attract the attention of its original promoters. Mr. W. B. Gurney eventually became the Treasurer of the Society; the duties of which office, in later years, he has shared with Mr. (now Sir) Samuel Morton Peto. In his hands it was no mere matter of finance. Not more for the largeness and frequency of his pecuniary contributions, than for the zeal with which he entered into all the Society's plans and proceedings, and the active part he took in exciting a missionary feeling, especially among the young, both in Sunday-schools and in private families, was it manifest that his whole heart and soul were engaged in the great work of diffusing the Gospel. own Mr. Gurney belonged to a class of pious laymen of whom but few representatives survive. His religion was intensely prac tical. Possessed of strong sense. and schooled in methodical habits, he always took a plain, business like view of every subject under his consideration, and approached his point of aim by the simplest means and the directest route. The acuteness of his penetration, his long experience, and the natural tendency of men less versed in affairs to defer to his sound judgment, may sometimes have given to his conduct the appearance of preferring his opinion, with little regard to the opinions of others. But this was only in appearance. His convictions of duty were so strong, and his obedience to them so prompt and implicit, that had not the st..cerity of his character given plainness and directness to his admonitions, he might, nevertheless, be said to have acquired a title to stimulate the lagging zeal of the church, as, in fact, he never hesitated to do, "with great plainness of speech As a religious philanthropist, he united the munificence of the prince with the unostentatiousness of the peasant, and did great things with as little apparent consciousness of their being great, as if he had been performing the most ordinary acts. His name will go down to posterity with the names of Robert Raikes, John Howard, and Thomas Wilson, whose varied excellences were combined in him, with a wisdom in counsel not less admirable than his zeal in action, or his liberality in giving. Several very characteristic articles from Mr. Gurney has appeared in our pages, under his well-known initials, "W. B. G." THE CHURCH. "Built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone."-Eph. ii. 20. JUNE, 1855. ABRAHAM'S SACRIFICE. BY DR. FRIEDR. STRAUSS. Genesis xxii. (Concluded from page 120.) The victory is won. The sacrifice is consummated. Inwardly indeed, but outwardly too, save the last short act which alone was wanting to complete it. He has grasped the knife;" then called the angel of the Lord from heaven." THEN! Oh, blessed THEN, when thou comest! Come thou wilt; long as is the delay, thou comest at last. And then comes the fulness of relief and joy. The angel of the Lord calls him from heaven. That voice which so late had called and required the most painful sacrifice, now calls and confers the richest joy. "Abraham! Abraham!" Twice calls the Lord, as if obedience thus proved-he himself hastens to the rescue. "And Abraham answers, Here am I." He is there. As once for the smart, so now for the joy,-as God wills, he is prepared; and prepared for the joy, because prepared for the smart. We, too, are addressed daily, "Rejoice in the Lord alway; and again I say, rejoice." "Let the joy of the Lord be your strength." But we do not rejoice, or feel happy, or make the joy of the Lord our strength, because we are not prepared for the smart. We must first learn by sorrow, to be able to rejoice; and our life must be a school in which we become fitted for happiness, ere we can enjoy the foretaste of happiness itself. But Abraham is prepared for the joy,-therefore says the angel, "Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him." Isaac is saved! The son is restored! There needs not an awaking from the dead! He shall not die! What joy must have quivered through Abraham's heart! Ye much-tried mothers, who have sat all day long at the sick-bed of your child, looking every moment for his death, and ten times the painful sacrifice have made, yet dread its consummation, to whom at length the physician has said, "The child lives!" or you, ye fathers, who, when lately the war raged around you, sent your son into the strife, have heard the thunder of the death-bearing artillery, and thought ye heard in that sound the death-peal of your son, then have clasped him, safe and victorious, in your arms again!-ye have experienced something akin to what Abraham felt. But no, not you, so much as you, ye pious parents, who long have mourned over the thoughtless unconcern of your child,-who oft have wept as you saw him walking along the broad road to destruction, and thus had to relinquish hopes, brighter than earthly ones, hopes for eternity, and to whom in an ever-memorable hour the son or the daughter has come and said, "Your prayer is heard; I was a lost child to you, but am won again; I have sought the Lord, and have found him,"-your joy and gratitude, in their depth and compass, may bear some resemblance to Abraham's joy and Abraham's thankfulness. You have learned, like him, that the Lord in infinite mercy, when we yield the sacrifice inwardly, restores it to us outwardly, because the design of the trial is attained. But Infinite Mercy is not wont to be satisfied with this alone. It not only restores to Abraham his son, but provides a sacrificial victim in his stead. "Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns." Just at the right time he spies the ram! Had he looked round a little earlier, perhaps he might only have had to say, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt-offering. "And he went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt-offering in the stead of his son." So once prayed Solomon for a wise and understanding heart, and seeking only this, God gave him not the wise and obedient heart alone, but also the good he had not sought-riches and long life. When we seek first the kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof, all other things needful for us will fall to our lot. We, foolish men, generally seek after the latter and least with all our might, and, in our delusion, think the former and greater will not fail us at last, but bring us out of our sin to the lofty joy which Abraham felt. True, his son's deliverance was something great, but the manifestation of God's grace in it was greater, and the joy will rise higher as the fulness of this abounding grace is manifested in such externally insignificant circumstances as the leading hither of the ram. As soon as we yield implicit obedience to the Lord, his grace at once becomes perceptible in our hearts, and is felt to be divine, that is, to be infinite and overflowing. The lesser gift becomes exuberant through the grace it brings to light; both the relief and the joy becomes unspeakable, and the inward and the outward, the greater and the less, all join to render our joy perfect. Let this, then, stand as the second lesson of our discourse, that when faith is shown by implicit obedience, it necessarily leads to unspeakable joy, and that finds us prepared, when perfect, to welcome not only the richest gift, but the smallest addition to it. But in what was the inmost joy of this joy? In the ram appearing? In the son being restored? In the trial having passed away? No; these were but the several occasions of the joy. Its inmost kernel lay in what the angel had previously said, "Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me. The angel of the Lord, the uncreated angel who is the Lord himself, knew from eternity of Abraham's faith, and from eternity saw that it would' stand this trial; and as he eternally foreknew the victory, and set Abraham so high for this effect of his grace, he could thus and then express this his eternal foreknowledge. But he expressed it to Abraham, and the Lord's knowledge of it was now Abraham's knowledge; and his own individual state before God was clear and known from the very Word of God. We know not our own faith till we come to know it by the Word of God. But the Word of God will be understood and apprehended only when that inexpressible joy of implicit obedience is in our heart alone. Obedience removes what in us resists faith, and so removes it that there is room for faith and the joy it brings to fill the heart. Then when the heart is filled with the joy of faith, we feel that faith itself can only be exercised in all its fulness when accompanied with its peace and joy. Then we understand the saying of our Lord, "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God." The will of the Lord must be done, we must believe and love, then the truth is felt, and assurance comes to view. Still, assurance comes not through obedience, but in it; as the apostle James teaches that the doer of the Word is blessed not through the doing, but in the doing. Obedience attains not to assurance by merit, but it removes that which stands in the way of it. The joy that follows faith is not assurance, but it is that by which assurance becomes obvious to us. The Word of God is the instrument, and the Spirit of God the agent; but the Spirit of God gives assurance by the Word of God only when implicit obedience has led to unspeakable joy. So was it with Abraham. Long had he been a believer, but only thus did he arrive at the full assurance of faith. On this account "he called the name of the place, "The Lord seeth;" and our text goes on, "therefore to this day it is said, On the Mount the Lord seeth."* He who knows that the Lord sees him, knows also that he sees the Lord; and the spot where we learn that the Lord looks with acceptance on our faith, is the spot to us where the Lord sees, and to which we come for assurance of divine grace. Oh, that the seat on which thou sittest, my dear hearer, the stone on which thou standest, the street through which thou passest to thy home, the closet in which thou to-day hast prayed, the chamber in which to-morrow thou wilt work, may become to thee a spot where the Lord seeth, so that whenever thou henceforth goest o standest, sittest or liest, on that spot, it may in a moment be to thee a place in which thou shalt be assured of the grace of thy God in Jesus Christ. "So Abraham turned again to his young men." They had no idea of what had happened to Abraham and Isaac during their absence; and while these were obeying the Word of the Lord with the severest struggle, and had passed an hour the most important in its bearing on time and eternity, they perhaps were occupied in worldly things. With this moment begins a new and advanced era of Abraham's life; and Isaac can never forget that hour, nor can the whole of his future life lose the impression of the mute pain of that moment in which his father would have sacrificed him. But this hour passed over the young men as others had done, and was lost as countless others have been. You perceive, dear hearers, why we give utterance to what is at best a conjecture on the face of the narrative. Would that the application we make of it were a mere conjecture too! For we must turn your attention to the final improvement of our discourse. God's Word shall not return to him void; and your stillness, your emotion, your reverential aspect, show that these grand narratives of Old Testament times have had their influence on many of you. But how stands it with you, who have listened to this discourse as you have done to many before, and remain unblest, because you would not accept the blessing which others permanently enjoy? Alas, it was with you as it was with these young men, and we can only warn you again! Beware, lest your whole life pass away like these hours, and at the close, when the time of your departure is come, your whole day of grace be lost. Ye whose heart, like Lydia's of old, the Lord has opened, who have learned how assurance is arrived at, and betimes have taken the road that leads to it, and through God's Word have come to a personal consciousness of it, turn ye to your home as Abraham and his son. "They arose, and went together to Beersheba, and dwelt there." It is not told us what was said by the way, or how they felt as they drew near *This is Luther's version, which is as far wrong as ours. It should be, "In the Mount Jehovah will provide." The verb is the same as in verse 8.-TRANS. to the oak under which their tents were pitched, or how Sarah welcomed them, or how they recounted in the family circle what the Lord had done for them. But we can easily fancy it all; and who has not wished to have been a listener to their discourse, and a witness of their joy? But you may enjoy it better here, than you could have enjoyed the hearing and the seeing of it yonder. Only be in earnest. Seek by prayer for the assurance of forgiveness of sin and divine grace. Tread in the path which the Old Testament heroes of the faith have taught you, and you too will reach the spot, which you can name, "The Mount where the Lord seeth;" then, born again and accepted, you will tread your family circle, and there recount what the Lord has done for you, and in the joy which his guidance inspires, shall a new bond of love arise between you and yours. In closing our discourse with this exhortation, it occurs to us that many youths and maidens are among you, who, having come hither from the country, are about shortly to return to their native place. Oh, my young brothers and sisters! when you draw near the turrets of your homesteads, when your mother, standing in the door, shouts your wel come home,-when hearts and arms of parents and sisters embrace you,then God grant that you, who came to town with perhaps a mere worldly object, may return to your much-loved homes with the richest spiritual blessing, and, not only uncorrupted, but blessed like the father of the faithful of whom we have read to-day, may you arrive at your Beersheba, and dwell there in peace! Amen. CHRISTIAN ANOMALIES. BY THE REV. C. ELVEN. "In which are some things hard to be understood."-1 Pet. iii. 16. This was said by Peter, of the writings of his "beloved brother Paul." But however true it might be of the Pauline epistles, there are the pro fessedly living epistles, known and read of all men," which present to the thoughtful observer far more insuperable difficulties. The spirit and conduct of many who bear the christian name, are much more inexplic able than the profoundest writings of the inspired apostle. The one class of difficulties are merely critical, the other moral. If we could suppose some enlightened visiter from another planet, without any previous acquaintance with us or our history, were commissioned to survey and report upon the condition, I will not say of the world, but of the christian church; and that his instructions should be, first, to study that book which we all agree to be the standard of our faith, and the guide of our conduct, and then to compare with it the lives of its avowed adherents and admirers; would he not find in these latter, " some things hard to be understood "? So it strikes us. But we shall better explain by suggesting a few examples. First, then, it is very hard to understand how a proud man can be a christian. Pride and piety are so diametrically opposed, that it is difficult to conceive of their co-existence, for if there be one grace more earnestly inculcated by the history, the precepts, and the examples of the Sacred Scriptures than another, surely it is humility. The Redeemer himself, our great exemplar, whose life was one brilliant galaxy of all moral excellences, selected this as worthy of the special regard and imitation of his disciples. "Learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of mind," &c., and on another occasion, as if he would engrave the precept upon their hearts, "He called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of |