the heathen world, and all the gleams of light that God had given it—all that was preparation for the Temple. Then mark how various may be our services for God. Just think of the thousands who were engaged by Solomon in the prosecution of his great design. They were all busy for one end and object, yet every man of them had his peculiar task. It took a special skill to hew the cedartrees; it was a work by itself to get them floated; it was not every navigator who could sail them to Joppa; nor every teamster who could deliver them safely to Jerusalem. Such gifts, and a thousand beside, were all needed, and were all sanctified for Temple service. We all have some gift that we can use for God. In the service of Christ and of His Church there is room for all manner of skill and activity. There are diversities of gifts, but the same spirit. Then note how silently God's Temple rose. God comes to us without sound of bell,' says the old proverb, and He who was greater than the Temple 'would not strive, nor cry, nor lift up His voice in the streets.'

TWENTY-EIGHTH SUNDAY

Evening

THE PARABLE OF THE POUNDS

Passage to be read: Luke xix. 11-27.

HE Gospel tells us what was the occasion of this

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parable. It was spoken to correct the false impression that the Kingdom of God should immediately appear. Roused by the miracles that they had seen so lately, and impressed by the crowds who were thronging around Jesus, the people (and it may be the disciples too)

were stirred to hope that the Kingdom was at hand. They little dreamed of the tragedy of Calvary, and of the strange departure of the Lord. It was then that Jesus, with infinite skill and power, narrated this little story of the nobleman. It was an emblem of His own departure to a far country to receive a kingdom. It taught in figure that first there must be departure, and the long absence of the King, before the Kingdom could come in its full glory. Note, too, how singularly apt was the choice of such a parable as this. For in Jericho, where it was uttered, there rose the palace of Archelaus, and Archelaus had acted like this nobleman. He had gone to Rome to seek a kingdom there, under the bitter hatred of the Jews. And the crowd may have been talking of Archelaus, when Jesus began this story of the nobleman. They could never forget it, then, it was so apposite. It seemed to rise out of their own experience. And so far am I from thinking that here we have two parables run together (as many have held) that I believe that our Lord deliberately chose that framework to introduce the lesson of the pounds.

NOW note that all these servants got the same endowment. That is the first point to be kept clear. In

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the talents, each servant got a different sum. ceived five, another two, and the third one. But here all the ten servants get the same amount; each gets one pound, and is to trade with that. That means that there are various gifts and graces which are bestowed in differing measures upon all; but there are some things we all receive alike, they are distributed equally amongst us. What are your talents then? that is the question; and what do you think your pound is? In other words, how do you differ from the folk around you, and in what respect are you all on the same footing? Well, one of you

is cleverer than the other, and one is stronger, and one

I believe the word

has a firmer will. These things, and a thousand things like these, I take it, are all comprehended in your talents. But have you not all got the Word of God alike? Is not the one Bible in your hearts and hands? that that is the pound we have to trade with of the Kingdom we have got from Christ. gone; we do not see Him now; but He has left with all of us the Gospel. And it is His word, so simple and so true, so full of wisdom, of power, and of love, that we are to play the merchant with (if I may use that word) till the King returns from the land that is far off.

BUT mark again what a little gift this was.

Jesus has

It almost

seems unworthy of a king. A talent was a tolerable sum of money-its value was somewhere over two hundred pounds. But a mina (for that is the word for pound in the original) was only some sixty shillings of our money. One mina to each servant from the nobleman-what a trifling gratuity it appears! Yet be sure that Jesus had a meaning in that-the sum was chosen in the Lord's perfect wisdom. Does it not tell us that what the nobleman wanted was to find if his followers were really faithful? It is often so much harder to be faithful in little things than in the great transactions. Make it a thousand pounds, and the dullest of all the servants would have felt the responsibility upon him. But make it one pound, and we shall soon discover the hearts that are lealest to their absent Lord. Now it is just that that Jesus longs to find. The risen Lord is saying, Lovest thou Me? And in the gifts we equally enjoy there is an abiding test of our love and loyalty. One look seems a small thing, and yet one look broke Simon Peter's heart. One sentence seems a very little thing, and yet one sentence converted the Philippian jailer. One pound seems quite a trifling gift, yet that gift becomes the touchstone of our character.

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BSERVE again that these servants were unequally rewarded, but they were rewarded according to their faithfulness. Did you ever note which of the three Christ praises? He only praises the man who made ten pounds. He rewards the servant whose pound had gained five pounds, but you will notice that He does not praise him. The man has done something, and he shall have his guerdon, but he gets no warm commendation from the Lord. Does not that hint that he who had gained five pounds might have done better if he had really tried? It was not inferior ability, Christ means, and it was not any bad luck in business, that kept him from winning ten pounds too. It was just that he had not traded with all his heart like the servant who was made happy with the praise. Let us learn, then, this simple lesson of rewards, that our faithfulness is going to be the measure of them. And let that thought make us doubly earnest to be very faithful with our pound. You say it is very little you can do? But because thou hast been faithful in very little, have thou authority over ten cities.'

NOTE, lastly, that unused gifts are misused gifts. The

man who did nothing with his dowry, lost it. He had not squandered it, that was the strange thing. He had only kept it useless in the napkin. Yet not to use it was finally to lose it. And it is always so with the good gifts of God. The gifts of God are never at home in napkins. We must employ them, if we would enjoy them. It is a commonplace. But it makes all the difference between success and failure here, and between life and death in the eternity.

TWENTY-NINTH SUNDAY

Morning

SOLOMON'S GREATNESS: THE QUEEN OF SHEBA Passage to be read: 1 Kings x. 1-15.

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O great was the magnificence of Solomon, and so widely had the rumours of it spread, that strangers were attracted to Jerusalem from all parts (v. 24). The city would often be thronged by multitudes speaking different languages, as it was afterwards thronged at the Feast of Pentecost (Acts ii.), when a glory greater than Solomon's was manifested. According to Eastern custom, too, and may we not say according to that law that to him that hath shall be given (Matt. xiii. 12), no man came without his gift. And we read of vessels of silver and vessels of gold, and garments and armour and spices and horses and mules, added to the abundance of the king (v. 25). I wonder what Saul, fresh from his father's farm (1 Sam. xi. 5), would have thought of this Egyptian magnificence. I wonder what David, who had his favourite mule (1 Kings i. 33), would have said to these chariots and caparisoned horses. For Josephus, who is great on Solomon's splendour, gives lavish details about the king in his chariot, with horses of incomparable swiftness, and drivers clothed in Tyrian purple, having dust of gold sprinkled in their hair (Antiq. VIII. vii. 3).

NOW among these strangers there came one who excited a quite peculiar interest. This was the Queen of Sheba, or as our Lord with an impressive