te more attention to
details of language and convey richer spiritual messages. Very
passingly and partially I have noted the more important details of word
and phrase, in the course of the translation. It remains to say not
what I would but what I can, in brief compass, upon the messages to the
Christian's soul.

Let us be quite practical, and let our study take the simplest form.
In this wonderful paragraph let us not only wonder; let us take its
sentences as revelations of fact. Here the Holy Spirit through the
Apostle sets before us some of the intended facts of the normal
Christian life. These precepts were not meant to dissolve into bright
dreams; they were to be obeyed in Philippi then, and in England now;
they were spoken for not ideal but actual human beings, the rank and
file of the followers of the Lord. These promises were not meant to be
met with an aspiration, followed by a sigh. They were to be received
and used, as certainties of the grace of God, "before the sons of men."

Come then to the paragraph once again, to study it with real life in
immediate view, and in the full consciousness of our own sin and
weakness. Here are some of the normal "possibilities of grace," not
for the strong and holy but for the very weak, for those who know that
"in their flesh dwelleth no good thing," but who come to Jesus, and (if
only for very fear and need) stay by Him.

Here then is the fact, first, that the Christian life, as such, is to
be, and may be, a life of "joy in the Lord always." Such is "the Lord"
that He is indeed able to be a perpetual cause of joy. The believer
has but to recollect HIM, to consider HIM, to converse with HIM, to
make use of HIM, in order to have in himself (not _of_ himself) "a well
of water, springing up unto eternal life." "In joy and sorrow, life
and death, His love is still the same"; for HE is still the same; and
the believing man is His.

He will henceforth covet, and cultivate, this life of holy "joy in the
Lord always." It is not a boisterous mirth; it is pure and chastened;
but it _is joy_. It is an unfigurative happiness, a deep practical
cheerfulness, full of health for him who has it, and a most powerful
secret for influence over those who have to do with him. Think of the
track of light left behind by lives of holy joy which we have watched!
It was good to be near them. The very things and places round them
were warmed and beautified by them. And their source