ew that your tribulation is an instrument
to produce hope, and you will be able to thank God for all the way by
which He has led you.

Now, brethren, the plain lesson of all this is just that we have
here, in these texts, a linked chain, one end of which is wrapped
around our sinful hearts, and the other is fastened to the Throne of
God. You cannot drop any of the links, and you must begin at the
beginning, if you are to be carried on to the end. If we are to have
a joy immovable, we must have a 'steadfast hope.' If we are to have a
'steadfast hope,' we must have a present 'grace.' If we are to have a
present 'grace,' and 'access' to the fullness of God, we must have
'peace with God.' If we are to have 'peace with God,' we must have
the condemnation and the guilt taken away. If we are to have the
condemnation and the guilt taken away, Jesus Christ must take them.
If Jesus Christ is to take them away, we must have faith in Him. Then
you can work it backward, and begin at your own end, and say, 'If I
have faith in Jesus Christ, then every link of the chain in due
succession will pass through my hand, and I shall have justifying,
peace, access, the grace, erectness, hope, and exultation, and at
last He will lead me by the hand into the glory for which I dare to
hope, the glory which the Father gave to Him before the foundation of
the world, and which He will give to me when the world has passed
away in fervent heat.'

A THREEFOLD CORD

'And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is
shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is
given unto us.'--ROMANS v. 5.

We have seen in former sermons that, in the previous context, the
Apostle traces Christian hope to two sources: one, the series of
experiences which follow 'being justified by faith' and the other,
those which follow on trouble rightly borne. Those two golden chains
together hold up the precious jewel of hope. But a chain that is to
bear a weight must have a staple, or it will fall to the ground. And
so Paul here turns to yet another thought, and, going behind both our
inward experiences and our outward discipline, falls back on that
which precedes all. After all is said and done, the love of God,
eternal, self-originated, the source of all Christian experiences
because of the work of Christ which originates them all, is the root
fact of the universe, and the guarantee that our highest
anticipations and desires are not unsubstanti