Page:Sermons preached in the African Protestant Episcopal Church of St. Thomas', Philadelphia.djvu/65

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ser. iii.]
spiritual prosperity of gaius.
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yet, like the apostle Paul, who, "forgetting those things that are behind, and reaching forth unto those things that are before, he pressed toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus."

The bright and shining example set before the world by this Christian, afforded grounds of rejoicing to the apostle John. "I rejoiced greatly" says he, "when the brethren came and testified of the truth that is in thee, even as thou walkest in the truth." While it is always a source of pleasure to a gospel minister to witness the general health and temporal prosperity of his fellow-Christians, yet does it afford him more exquisite joy, when they give a good testimony to the truth, by their walking as it becomes the gospel. As there can scarcely be a greater obstacle in the way of sinners duly considering the claims of Christianity, than the loose and irregular lives of those who professedly say: "Lord, Lord,

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