dead flesh. It is our highest good, because if that great
message of salvation is received into a heart, or moulds the life of a
nation, it will bring after it, as its ministers and results, all manner
of material and lesser benefit. And so, giving Christ we give _our_
best, and giving Christ we give the highest gift that a weary world can
receive.

Remember, too, that the impartation of this highest good is one of the
main reasons why we ourselves possess it. Jesus Christ can redeem the
world alone, but it cannot become a redeemed world without the help of
His servants. He needs us in order to carry into all humanity the
energies that He brought into the midst of mankind by His Incarnation
and Sacrifice; and the cradle of Bethlehem and the Cross of Cavalry are
not sufficient for the accomplishment of the purpose for which they
respectively came to pass, without the intervention and ministry of
Christian people. It was for this end amongst others, that each of us
who have received that great gift into our hearts have been enriched by
it. The river is fed from the fountains of the hills, in order that it
may carry verdure and life whithersoever it goes. And you and I have
been brought to the Cross of Christ, and made His disciples, not only in
order that we ourselves might be blessed and quickened by the gift
unspeakable, but in order that through us it may be communicated, just
as each particle when leavened in the mass of the dough communicates its
energy to its adjacent particle until the whole is leavened.

I am afraid that indifference to the communication of the highest good,
which marks sadly too many Christian professors in all ages, and in this
age, is a suspicious indication of a very slight realisation of the good
for themselves. Luther said that justification was the article of a
standing or a falling church. That may be true in the region of
theology, but in the region of practical life I do not know that you
will find a test more reliable and more easy of application than this,
Does a man care for spreading amongst his fellows the gospel that he
himself has received? If he does not, let him ask himself whether, in
any real sense, he has it. 'Well-doing' includes doing good to others,
and the possession of Christ will make it certain that we shall impart
Him.

II. Notice the bearing of this elementary injunction upon the scope of
the obligation.

'Let us do good to all men.' It was Christianity that inve