is the grace of God,'
is not possible with a starvation diet of Scripture. And so I would say,
try to get hold of the depth and width of meaning in the Word.

Again, try to keep heart and mind in contact with it amidst distractions
and daily duties. Try to bring the principles of the New Testament
consciously to bear on the small details of everyday life. Do you look
at your day's work through these spectacles? Does it ever occur to you,
as you are going about your business, or your profession, or your
domestic work, to ask yourselves what bearing the gospel and its truths
have upon these? If my ordinary, so-called secular, avocations are
evacuated of reference to, and government by, the Word of God, I want
to know what of my life is left as the sphere in which it is to work.
There is no need that religion and daily life should be kept apart as
they are. There is no reason why the experience of to-day, in shop, and
counting-house, and kitchen, and study, should not cast light upon, and
make more real to me, 'the true grace of God.' Be sure that you desire,
and ask for, and put yourself in the attitude of receiving, the gifts of
that love, which are the graces of the Christian life. And when you have
got them, apply them, 'that you may be able to withstand in the evil
day; and, having done all, to stand.'

THE CHURCH IN BABYLON

'The church that is at Babylon, elected together with you, saluteth
you ...'--1 Peter v. 13.

We have drawn lessons in previous addresses from the former parts of the
closing salutations of this letter. And now I turn to this one to see
what it may yield us. The Revised Version omits 'the church,' and
substitutes 'she'; explaining in a marginal note that there is a
difference of opinion as to whether the sender of the letter is a
community or an individual. All the old MSS., with one weighty
exception, follow the reading 'she that is in Babylon.' But it seems so
extremely unlikely that a single individual, with no special function,
should be bracketed along with the communities to whom the letter was
addressed, as 'elected together with' them, that the conclusion that the
sender of the letter is a church, symbolically designated as a 'lady,'
seems the natural one.

Then there is another question--where was Babylon? An equal diversity
of opinion has arisen about that. I do not venture to trouble you with
the arguments _pro_ and _con_, but only express my own opinion that
'