ll fulfil every work of faith. Our
faith in Jesus Christ will naturally tend to influence our lives, and to
manifest itself as a driving power which will set all the wheels of
conduct in motion. Paul is quite sure that if we trust ourselves to God,
all the beneficent and holy work that flows from such confidence will by
Him be fully perfected.

God's fulfilment is to be done _with power_. That is to say, He will fit
us to be worthy of our calling, He will answer our desires, He will give
energy to our faith, and complete in number and in quality its
operations in our lives, by reason of His dwelling with us and in us by
that spirit of power and of love and of a sound mind which works all
righteousness in believing hearts, and sheds divine beauty and goodness
over character and life.

III. Lastly, note the divine glory of the worthy.

This fulfilment of every desire of goodness and work of faith is in
order 'that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you
and ye in Him.'

Here, again, as in the first clause of our text, I take, in accordance
with the prevailing tone of this letter, the reference to be mainly,
though perhaps not exclusively, to a future transcendent glorifying of
the name of Christ in perfected saints, and glorifying of perfected
saints in Jesus Christ.

We have, then, set forth, first, as the result of the fulfilling of
Christian men's desires after goodness, and the work of their faith, the
glory that accrues to Christ from perfected saints. They are His
workmanship. You remember the old story of the artist who went into a
fellow-artist's studio and left upon the easel one complete circle,
swept with one master-whirl of the brush. Jesus Christ presents
perfected men to an admiring universe as specimens of what He can do.
His highest work is the redeeming of poor creatures like you and me, and
the making of us perfect in goodness and worthy of our calling. We are
His _chefs-d'oeuvre_, the master work of the great divine artist.

Think, then, brethren, how, here and now, Christ's reputation is in our
hands. Men judge of Him by us. The name of the Lord Jesus is glorified
in you if you live 'worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,' and
people will think better of the Master if His disciples are faithful.
Depend upon it, if we of this church, for instance, and the Christian
people within these walls now, lived the lives that they ought to do,
and manifested the power of the Gosp