xt to 'walk worthy of God.' Then
again, we are enjoined, in other places, to 'walk worthy of the Lord,'
who is Christ. Or again, 'of the Gospel of Christ.' Or again, 'of the
calling wherewith we were called.' Or again, of the name of 'saints.'
And if you put all these together, you will get many sides of one
thought, the rule of Christian life as gathered into a single
expression--correspondence with, and conformity to, a certain standard.

I. And first of all, we have this passage of my text, and the other one
to which I have referred, 'Walking worthy of the Lord,' by whom we are
to understand Christ. We may put these together and say that the whole
sum of Christian duty lies in conformity to the character of a Divine
Person with whom we have loving relations.

The Old Testament says: 'Be ye holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.'
The New Testament says: 'Be ye imitators of God, and walk in love.' So
then, whatever of flashing brightness and infinite profundity in that
divine nature is far beyond our apprehension and grasp, there are in
that divine nature elements--and those the best and divinest in
it--which it is perfectly within the power of every man to copy.

Is there anything in God that is more Godlike than righteousness and
love? And is there any difference in essence between a man's
righteousness and God's;--between a man's love and God's? The same gases
make combustion in the sun and on the earth, and the spectroscope tells
you that it is so. The same radiant brightness that flames burning in
the love, and flashes white in the purity of God, even that may be
reproduced in man.

Love is one thing, all the universe over. Other elements of the bond
that unites us to God are rather correspondent in us to what we find in
Him. Our concavity, so to speak, answers to His convexity; our
hollowness to His fulness; our emptiness to His all-sufficiency. So our
faith, for instance, lays hold upon His faithfulness, and our obedience
grasps, and bows before, His commanding will. But the love with which I
lay hold of Him is like the love with which He lays hold on me; and
righteousness and purity, howsoever different may be their
accompaniments in an Infinite and uncreated Nature from what they have
in our limited and bounded and progressive being, in essence are one.
So, 'Be ye holy, for I am holy'; 'Walk in the light as He is in the
light,' is the law available for all conduct; and the highest divine
perfections, if I