---

As soon as spirit touches spirit there springs up between them a relationship which we call moral. Whatever rightly flows from such spiritual contact is morally good. It is in the intercourse of human society that man proves himself to be a moral being. Faith, by admitting us into fresh contact with God and with our fellows, by endowing us with new relationships that have become ours through our inclusion within the new humanity, even the body of Christ, has necessarily laid upon us new moral obligations, responsibilities, and functions, all of which spring out of the very nature of our corporate faith. If we would determine the lines and features of the Christian temper and character we must look to the nature of that great fellowship into which we have been called. The Christian character asked of us is that habit, that activity, which must follow on our acceptance within the assembly of the first born, within the city of God. Whatever that acceptance makes desirable and natural, that is good and that is holy. The Church is a moral conception, a moral condition, by which we are to determine character.

I. THE CHURCH IS A HOUSEHOLD. What are the virtues essential to a household such as our Lord pictures, an organised kingdom of work? Fertile activity. The character will be forthcoming, energetic, stirring. The household demands activity of character, and it asks for a skilled and trained activity. What type and rule of character is suggested by —

II. THE CHURCH AS A FAMILY. It is a nursery and school of virtue. A family produces a character of courtesy, a sensitive recognition of varying characteristics, a delicate sense of others' rights. It instills self-repression, self-control, honour for one another, esteem of one another, the stooping of the strong to the weak. Negative self-repression will learn to give itself positive outflow in sympathy, tenderness, and affection.

III. THE CHURCH AS A BODY. What stamp does that great conception set upon character? It adds one peculiar note, the note of witness. A body is in essence the evidence, the proof, the pledge of that which acts through it. Its sole function throughout all its parts is to make manifest that secret presence which animates and directs it. The Christian who is of the body has mission, has vocation. He is there on earth to declare the name, to manifest the glory of God. The Christian character must therefore be stamped with the seal of mission.

IV. THE CHURCH AS A TEMPLE. There is to be positive beauty in the Christian character, It is to be full of delicate and lovely refinement. There is to be a touch upon it of grace, a charm of majesty and consecration. A character built up out of purity and love will have about it also the sense of mystery, the spirit of the temple. Purity and mystery, the temple gifts, where are they? Where are they in us, in our lives, so mixed, so unpurged, and so worldly? Not until we are more evidently of the body and of the temple will men be able to recognise and confess, "this is the generation of them that seek Him, that seek Thy face, O Jacob!"

(Canon H. Scott Holland.)

---

---

KJV: Who shall ascend into the hill of the LORD? or who shall stand in his holy place?

WEB: Who may ascend to Yahweh's hill? Who may stand in his holy place?