Page:Sermons on the Lord's Prayer.djvu/63

 "Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."

Such is the consequence of regeneration! Such is the reward held out to him, who is willing to "fight the good fight" and overcome. This, then, is what above all things is to be desired—and this, therefore, is what before all things we need to pray for—namely, that the Lord's will with us may be done, as in our "heaven," so in our "earth;" that is, that our natural mind may be brought into subjection to and agreement with, our spiritual mind; in other words, that we may be regenerated. This is the summum bonum—this is the great good to be sought—this should be the chief object of our prayers and efforts. For all things depend on this; all joys, all delights, all happiness, all that is worth existing for, through the ages of eternity, depend on this,—our regeneration. For regeneration is the being brought into heavenly order; it is the re-forming of the soul into God's image and likeness, which it was intended to be; it is the preparation of the mind for the reception of all the delights that fill heaven, of all the joys that flow from the exhaustless fountain of joy—the Lord himself. Without this preparation, those joys cannot be received or perceived by man's spirit; without this reformation, man cannot he gifted with the eternal happiness which the Lord longs to confer upon him; without such regeneration,—without being born again, no man, it is written, can "see the kingdom of God. If a happy life, then, not for this world only, but for the endless ages of eternity, be a thing most desirable,