JO 'CONQUEST STEP, ßEATL reign with him. If we conquer death by faith, we shall rise amt triumph. Here we labour and fight withmany adversaries, and we think we have routed them, but they rally again, and give us fresh vexation, so that we hardly know how to attempt a song of victory on this side the grave. Besides, death still remains for our trial and conflict; but there we shall rejoice over all our enemies, subdued, destroyed and abolished for ever. Then God will be all in all to his saints. This is a conse- quent which St. Paul mentions in the verses where my text is : God will manage the affairs of his heavenly kingdom in a more immediate way, than he has managed his kingdom on earth. Christ having destroyed all the enemies of his church, and pre- sented it safe before the Father, has finished all those divine purposes for which the mediatorial kingdom was entrusted with him; then he shall resign his commission to the Father again ; and the ever blessed God shall in a more immediate and absolute manner reign over all the creation. He shall more immediately impress devils and damned spirits with a sense of infinitewrath ; and with a more immediate sense of his love and eternal favour, shall he for ever bless all the inhabitants of heaven. So much. as this seems to be implied in the words of the apostle ; 1 Cor. xv. 24, 25, &c. But it is impossible that in this state we should know either the full extent, or the just limitations of that pro- mise, God shall be all in all. Our honoured and departed friend had these words dwelling upon her heart ; these were often in her lips in the days of her faith and hope, and in the hours of her passage through the dark valley : She enjoys part of the pleasure of them in her present heaven, and withplea- sure she expects the more absolute accomplishment, when the resurrection shall complete the blessedness of all the saints. Another consequent of the destruction of death, is.the em- ployment ofall the powers of human nature in the service of God, and they shall be neither weak nor weary. For all the incon- veniences that attend mortality shall be swallowed up and lost for ever. Alas how poor and imperfect is the service whichour bodies yield to God in this world ! How heavily do our souls complain of the clog of this flesh, and move onwards heavily in the dis- charge of duty ! and in the grave the body is quite cut off from all service. But when death shall be dispossessed, when we shall arise from the dust, and put on bodies of glory ; then with our whole natures and with all their powers, we shall do honour to God our Creator, our Redeemer, and our King. The time will come when weshallhangerno more,neither thirst any more; and the refreshments of sleep shall be no more necessary to support life. When death shall be destroyed, sleep, the image and pic- sure of death, shall be destroyed too. There shall be nothing
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