the Father.

He says,

"And now, O Father,

glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world

was.

Thou lovedst me before the founda

tion of the world" (John xvii. 5, 24).

But I must go on to the second word of our verse the word "created.” I call it the second, because though it comes third in our translation, it is the second word of the verse in the original Hebrew, and I follow the same order.

"Created," means made of nothing. These things were not; but God spoke, and they were.

It is through faith, St. Paul tells us, “that we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God; so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear" (Heb. xi. 3).

We must distinguish carefully between the two words "created" and "made." Moses observes the difference when he says, "God rested from all his work which he created and made" (Gen. ii. 3).

A watchmaker makes a watch, but he does not and can not create it. He gets the gold, and the copper, and the zinc, and the steel,

and all the other materials out of the earth, and then he forms them into a watch; but he could not have made it of nothing. Man can make, but God alone can create. No man, no, not even one of the angels of heaven can create even the smallest grain of dust.

These words, "God created," ought to fill our minds with wonder and admiration.

Does it not make known to us the immense distance between the Creator and all his creatures? How far he is above all, not only above us, poor worms of the dust, but above the highest of the angels! There is less distance between a grain of dust and the highest archangel, than there is between the archangel whom God has created and called out of nothing, and the great God who has created him. The smallest insect and the highest angel, the smallest speck of dust and the starry heavens, are all alike God's creatures— he created them all. He alone is the Creatorfar above all, greater than we can even conceive. The angels are commanded to worship the eternal Son who created them; as it is written, "Let all the angels of God worship him" (Col. i. 16; Heb. i. 6).

When we think of God, we may well say with the Psalmist, "Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high, I cannot attain unto it"—"Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised; his greatness is unsearchable" "No man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end”— 'Unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out"-" How little a portion is heard of him? but the thunder of his power who can understand?" (Ps. cxxxix. 6; cxlv. 3; Eccles. iii. 11; Rom. xi. 33; Job xxvi. 14).

This wonderful thought, "God created," makes known to us still further what God is to us, and what we ought to be to God.

God is all, and we are nothing. He can do all, since he has called all things from nothing, and all things are his. By him all things are; he "upholds them all continually by the word of his power." God knows all, since he has made all; the immensity of the heavens, and the earth from its surface to its centre, the heart of man and the hearts of angels, all are alike open in his sight. He has "numbered the very hairs of our heads," and counted the sands of the sea, and measured the dust of the

earth, as he has also counted the unnumbered starry suns that roll on high in the heavens above our heads. "Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these [the stars], that bringeth out their host by number: he calleth them all by names, by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one faileth" (Isa. xl. 12, 26).

The same God who created all things governs all things. He keeps them every moment by the same almighty power which called them into being at first.

Unless he were to keep them continually they could not continue to be, and their preservation is a continual creation. Thus our

Lord Jesus Christ says, hitherto and I work."

"My Father worketh All the creatures are

They could not live

ever depending upon God. if he did not keep them alive. The Psalmist says, O Lord, "Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth thy Spirit, they are created; and thou renewest the face of the earth" (Ps. civ. 29, 30).

O my friends! how much reason we have

to give ourselves willingly to God, whose we are to whom we rightfully belong.

Happy is he," says the Psalmist, "that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God; which made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that therein is; which keepeth truth for ever; which executeth judgment for the oppressed; which giveth food to the hungry" (Ps. cxlvi. 5–7).

This wonderful thought, "God created," is continually repeated again and again, in every part of the Scriptures, by men of God, prophets and apostles, and by the angels of light,—yes, even by the divine Son of God himself.

Hear Moses, how many times he repeats it; hear David, his Psalms are full of it; hear Job, he speaks of it with wonder. Hear the apostles, they constantly return to this thought. They use it in pleading with God in prayer. We are told that "they lifted up their voice to God with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven and earth, and the sea, and all that in them is" (Acts iv. 24). They use it as an argument in their preaching. We preach unto you," say they, "that ye should turn from these vanities unto the