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These striking words suggest to us -

I. CHRIST'S CONSCIOUS CONNECTION WITH THE ETERNAL FATHER. Had there not been in him a profound and abiding consciousness that, in a sense far transcending our own experience, God dwelt in him and he in God, these words would have been wholly indefensible; they would have been in the last degree immodest. Proceeding from any other than the Son of God himself, they would have simply repelled us, and would have cast grave discredit on every other utterance from the same lips. It was because he was Divine, and felt the authority which his Divinity conveyed, that he could and did use such words as these without any trace of assumption; without violating that "meekness and lowliness of heart" which he claimed to possess - the possession of which neither friend nor enemy has attempted to dispute.

II. THE PERMANENCE OF TRUTH COMPARED WITH THE TRANSITORINESS OF MATTER. It is only in a limited and figurative sense that we can speak of material things as eternal. The hour will come when they will perish; indeed, they are perishing as we speak. The immovable rocks, the everlasting hills, are being disintegrated by sun and rain; the fixed earth rises and falls; the "changeless rivers" are cutting new courses for their waters. Only truth abides; it is only the words in which the thought of the Eternal is expressed that do not pass away. Fashions do not touch it with their finger; revolutions do not overthrow it; dispensations leave it in its integrity. We look particularly at -

III. THE IMMORTALITY OR THE THOUGHTS OF CHRIST.

1. We have found him a true Prophet. Events have happened according to his word.

2. We are finding hint to be the Divine Teacher of truth to-day. He has that to say to us which, in our better moods and worthier moments, we hunger and thirst to hear. In his deathless words there are still treasured for us salvation from our sin, comfort in our sorrow, sanctity in our joy, strength in our struggle, companionship in our loneliness, and peace and hope in our decline and death. Unto whom shall we go if we sit at his feet no longer?

3. We shall find him the Source of truth in the after-life. Death will not make his words less true, even of it makes some of them less applicable than they are here and now. His thoughts will never lose their hold upon our heart, never cease to affect and shape our course. The truths which Jesus spake eighteen centuries ago will beautify our life and bless our spirit in the furthest epochs and the highest spheres of the heavenly world.

(1) If we would render the truest service to ourselves, we shall do our utmost to fill our minds with the thoughts of Christ; for these will prepare us for any and every condition, here or hereafter, in which we can possibly be placed.

(2) If we would serve our race most effectively, we shall consider in how many ways we can impress his thoughts upon the minds of men and weave them into the institutions of the world. And we shall find, at any rate, these three:

(a) The testimony of a Christian life.

(b) The utterance, in public or in private, of Christian doctrine.

(c) The support of Christian institutions. - C.

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KJV: Heaven and earth shall pass away: but my words shall not pass away.

WEB: Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will by no means pass away.