To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

I INCLOSE a discourse recently delivered on a special occasion. If you consider it likely to be useful in the present state of our Church, it is very much at your service.

1 CORR. ii. 2.

T. H. H.

"I determined not to know any thing among you, save JESUS CHRIST and HIM CRUCIFIED."

Of all the prejudices raised against the Gospel, when it was first preached, this was the greatest, viz., That its author, the Lord Jesus Christ, had come to so miserable and ignominious an end, as to die upon the cross; crucifixion being accounted the most infamous of all capital punishments. Freemen and citizens of Rome were not subjected to it; the Romans having restricted it to the basest of their slaves, when they committed any atrocious crimes. and degradation attached to every one upon whom this punishment was The utmost opprobrium inflicted and the Jews regarded it as a consequence of the Divine malediction; because it is written in their law, accursed of God;" (Deut. xxi. 23; Gal. iii. 13.) Yet such was the pun"He that is hanged, is ishment endured by Jesus Christ.

upon

the cross.

Saint Paul was not ignorant to how low a degree of humiliation Jesus descended, in submitting himself voluntarily to the death of a malefactor the preaching of the cross was He knew that, in consequence of that ignominious death, to the Greeks foolishness," (1 Cor. i. 25); and that, in proposing his a stumbling-block to the Jews, and Divine crucified Master to the faith, adoration, and love of mankind, he would infallibly excite against himself the hatred and rage of the Jews, and the disdainful sarcasms of the Greeks. Paul knew, moreover, that if he confined himself to preaching the circumcision, that is to say, the precepts and ceremonial institutions of the law of Moses, he would not only escape persecution but would continue to enjoy the good will and esteem CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 61.

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of his own sect and people. Nevertheless, it was the cross, or the doctrine of salvation through a crucified Redeemer,-and particularly this fundamental truth, that Jesus died upon the cross in order to make atonement for sin, and reconcile us unto God; and that He has put away sin by the sacrifice of himself upon the cross,-so that, now, all who believe in him shall not perish, but have everlasting life:-it was this very doctrine of the cross, so opposed to all human systems, opinions, and prejudices, as well as to his own credit and temporal interest :this very doctrine it was, which the Apostle preferred to every other, and which he preached "in season and out of season.” He did not consider the cross as a mere supplement to the knowledge which he had already acquired, or as a secondary object of his preaching; but he regarded it as the ONLY foundation which can be laid, and on which he must build all his instructions. To him the cross was every thing; and he renounced every thing for the cross. Though he was a Pharisee, who had been "brought up at the feet of Gamaliel," and "taught according to the perfect manner of the law;" and though he knew how to derive illustrations of what he taught from so many sources of human science; yet he not only relinquished them all, but he even accounted them as utterly worthless, in comparison of the excellency of the knowledge of Christ. Hence it was, that, penetrated with a conviction of the unworldly character of the Gospel dispensation, he wrote to the Corinthians in the following terms:-"And I, brethren, when I came to you, came, not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God: for I DETERMINED NOT TO KNOW ANY THING AMONG YOU, SAVE JESUS CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED." (1 Cor. ii. 1, 2.)

Christ Crucified is, indeed, the library which the souls of the blessed in heaven will be studying to all eternity." This," said the eminently learned Bishop Stillingfleet, "is the true medicine of the soul, which cures all maladies and distempers. Other knowledge makes men's minds giddy and turgid; this settles and composes them to the truest view of themselves, and thereby to humility and sobriety. Other knowledge leaves men's hearts as it found them; this purifies and makes them better." It is not astonishing, therefore, that St. Paul DETERMINED NOT TO KNOW ANY THING, SAVE JESUS CHRIST, AND HIM CRUCIFIED. These words present to our meditation three important topics, viz.: The FACT asserted respecting the Apostle's preaching; the great THEME or subject of all his discourses and writings; and the PRACTICAL RESULTS of the doctrine of Christ Crucified."

I. We are, in the first place, to investigate the FACT asserted respecting the Apostle's preaching.

No sooner was Paul miraculously converted, than he "STRAIGHTWAY preached Christ in the synagogues, that he is the son of God:" and the Acts of the Apostles, as well as his own Epistles, attest how earnestly and faithfully he set forth the doctrine of "Christ Crucified," -not as an esoteric or private doctrine, which was to be imparted only to a few individuals, or to be promulgated with reserve, but as the great, the sole foundation of man's salvation: "for other foundation can NO man lay than that is laid, which is Christ Jesus." (1 Cor. iii. 11.) The method pursued by the Apostle in illustrating this great theme of his discourses was various according as he addressed Jews or Gentiles. He adapted his instructions to the genius, and even to the prejudices, of the people to whom he preached. To the Jews he cited their prophets;

and to the Greeks, their philosophers and poets. At Jerusalem his eloquence was Jewish; and at Athens it was Athenian. But, in every instance, his conduct proved how deeply he was penetrated with the supreme importance of this fundamental doctrine of the Gospel.

1. Thus, "he confounded the JEWS who dwelt at Damascus," overwhelming them with his arguments; and proving, or demonstrating by a connected series of facts and reasonings, that Jesus is very Christ, or the Messiah. (Acts ix. 23.) Most probably he pursued the same line of argument, which he afterwards addressed to the Jews at Thessalonica; with whom he reasoned," for three successive Sabbath days, "out of the Scripture; opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead; and that this Jesus, whom he preached unto them, was Christ." (Acts xvii. 2, 3.) His method seems to have been this-He first collected the scriptures which spoke of the Messiah, and then he applied them to Jesus of Nazareth; shewing that in him all these scriptures were fulfilled, and that he was the Saviour whose advent they expected. He also shewed that the Christ, or Messiah, must needs suffer; that this was foretold by the Prophets, and was an essential mark of the true Messiah. By proving this point, he corrected their erroneous notions of a triumphant Messiah, victorious over their national enemies; and thus removed the scandal of the cross. To the Jews at Antioch in Pisidia, he made known the atonement, death, and resurrection of Jesus, "through whom was preached the forgiveness of sins; and by him all that believe are justified from all things," from the guilt of all transgressions against God, "from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses." (Acts xiii. 26-39.) At Corinth, "he reasoned" in a similar way "in the Synagogue, every Sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and Greeks that Jesus was the Christ. (Acts xviii. 4, 5.) What account did the Apostle give to King Agrippa concerning his ministry? "I witness," he said, "both to small and great, saying none other things than those which Moses did say should come: that Christ should suffer, and that he should be the first that should rise from the dead, and should shew light to the" Jewish " ple, and to the Gentiles." (xxvi. 22, 23.) And, finally, to the Jews at Rome "he expounded and testified the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus, both out of the Law of Moses and" out "of the Prophets." (xxviii. 23.) In all these cases, the sufferings and vicarious death of Christ, and consequently the doctrine of his crucifixion, formed the grand theme of the Apostle's discourses to the Jews:

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2. As they also did in his addresses to the GENTILES, with whom, however, he pursued a somewhat different line of argument.

At Athens, for instance, Paul took occasion,-from an altar erected to the unknown God, to announce to the Athenians the true God; and in the compass of a few sentences, he, with singular ability, refuted the errors of the religion of the common people, as well as those of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers. And he preached unto them Jesus and the Resurrection," and "also a future judgment of the world by Jesus Christ," whom God had raised from the dead;-not only the resurrection, but also the mission of Christ, and his atonement. (Acts

xvii. 17-31.)

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"heard him concerning the faith in Christ," the Apostle "reasoned of So, when Felix, the Roman governor, sent for Paul, AFTER he had righteousness, temperance, and a judgment to come.

doctrine of the deity, atonement, and the judgment of man by Jesus