p263 [To the same.] [From the French.] Mons. Eynard, The entirely new life of the Christian (1 John), communion founded upon known relationships in which we find ourselves with God, the absolute superiority of the Christian over all that he encounters (the experience of the Epistle to the Philippians), all these things have occupied me much of late. What a position is ours! What known relationships with God, in which we walk according to the new life in which we are accepted in Christ; a life which enjoys Christ, the measure of our acceptance and of our relationships - Himself also the life: happy everywhere (according to the will of God) because we are everywhere in Him, and, in this sense, always ourselves. Still, the tranquillity in which we can enjoy Him is very sweet.

What a scene that is of Stephen before the Sanhedrim! Perfect calm; heaven opened; the history of man, who always resists the Holy Ghost, and trusts in a temple deserted of God; man filled with the Holy Ghost - himself the temple - bearing testimony which they resist. See him, while they are killing him, quietly kneeling down to pray for them, a perfect reflection down here of Jesus, while beholding Him on high. The whole judgment of man turns upon the testimony of this chapter; and his whole position in Christ is there depicted.

[1858.]

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