in. The sinner's whole inner man is defiled with sin. This may
be illustrated by the spots and scales and raw blotches on the skin,
caused by the disease called leprosy. This disease affected every part
of the body; but, like smallpox and some other kindred affections, it
made itself mostly visible upon the surface of the body. It gave the
victim a horrible appearance, so much so that no one was willing but
such as were similarly afflicted, to go near a leper. But the water of
Divine Truth will effectually and forever wash away all this filth and
loathsomeness from the redeemed sinner's soul and prepare his
spiritual body for that bright array of fine linen, clean and white,
in which the saints shall be clothed as a fit emblem of their
righteousness. Paul calls all this the washing of regeneration. In
that great change, without which no man can see the kingdom of heaven,
called regeneration, or the new birth, wrought by God only, the water
of truth is the means employed. This is so evident that water is
specifically named in connection with it in these words: "Except a man
be born of water, and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of
heaven."

Ananias did not forget this when instructing the penitent Saul of
Tarsus; for at the close of all the words the Lord had authorized him
to say to Saul, we find these: "And now, why tarriest thou? Arise, and
be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling upon the name of the
Lord. And Saul arose and was baptized." Saul's sins were not washed
away by the water in which his body was baptized, but that water
symbolized the truth, the Lord's truth, that does wash away sins. And
his being immersed in it in each of the three names, according to the
great commission which the Lord had given some time before, signified
his faith in the Word of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Ghost. Peter says: "Baptism is not the washing away of the filth of
the flesh," but I feel authorized to say that it is the outward sign
or emblem of the power of divine truth to wash away the filth of the
soul. The change in Saul, wrought by this act as the crown of
obedience, was so great that from this time on he was a new man, and
had a new name, for he was called Paul ever after.

But we must not forget that salvation is all of God. Of ourselves we
can do nothing. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. All that man
can do is to take the Lord's hand and be led in the way; to open his
eyes to the lig