The Grave Spoiled

“I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues: 0 Grave, I will be thy destruction.” — Hos. xili. 14.

Christian! the Grave is lighted with Immanuers love. The darkest of all clouds — that which rests over the land of Hades — has the brightest Bow in it. These gloomy portals are not to hold thj loved and lost for ever. The land of forgetfulness, where thy buried treasures lie, is not a winter of unbroken darkness and desolation. A glorious spring-time of revival is promised, when the mortal shall put on immortality, and the corruptible shall be clothed with “incorruption.”

The Resurrection of the body! It is the climax of the work of Jesus — its culminating glory. St. Paul represents a longing Church

—as “waiting for the adoption, (to wit), Jie redempiion of the ‘body.’’’’ It was the pre-eminent theme of Ms preaching; “He preached unxo them Jesus, and the resurrection of the dead It was the loved article in his creed, which engrossed his own holiest aspirations, “If by any means I might attain untc the resurrection of the deadP It was the grand solace he administered to other mourners. It is not when speaking of the immediate bliss of the departed spirit at the hour of death, but it is when dwelling on “the last trump” — the dead “riS’ ing incorruptible,” and “caught up,” in their resurrection bodies, “to meet the Lord,” that he saj’s —” Wherefore comfort one another luith these words.^’’

Blessed day — the great Easter of creation! the dawn of the Sabbatic morn! the Julilee of a triumphant Church! Christian mourner !, go not to the grave to weep there. Every particle of that mouldering dust is redeemed by the oblation of Calvary; and the great Abolisher of death is only awaiting the ingathering of His elect, to give the commission

So THE BOW IN THE CLOUD.

to His arcliangels regarding all His saints, wbicli He gave of old regarding one, ‘Loose him, and let him go I”

And who can image forth the glory of these Resurrection bodies, reunited to their glorified •companion-spirits, fashioned like their Lord’s? every sense, every faculty — purified, sublimated, instinct with holiness; emulous with ardor in His service, eager to execute His will; retaining, it may be, the personal identities of earth, the old features worn in the “nether valley,” Now, reunited to death-divided friends in ties which know no dissolation — no trace of grief lingering on their countenances — no accents of sorrow trembling on their tongues I The Lamb, in the midst of the throne, “leading” them and “feeding” them; climbing along with them, steep by steep, in the path of life, and saying at each ascending step in the endless progression, “I will shew you greater things than these!”

Meanwhile He has Himself risen as the pledge of this Resurrection of all His people. Tbe Great Sheaf has been waved before the

Throne as the Earnest of the mighty Harvest.” Christ the first fruits afterward they that are Chrisfs at His coming

“Blessed and holy is he that hath ])art in tht first Resurrection /”