SERMON VI.

JOHN XVIII. 36.

JESUS ANSWERED; MY KINGDOM IS NOT OF THIS WORLD.

WHEN Our Savior was brought before Pilate, and maliciously charged by the Jews with affecting regal power, Pilate asks," Art thou the King of the Jews?" and receives the reply in the text, "My kingdom is not of this world."

In the opinion of the Roman judge it appears to have been explicit and satisfactory; for he went out, without delay, to our Savior's accusers, to protest, a second time, that he found no fault in him. This reply, which, at the time, seems to have produced in the mind of Pilate a conviction of the innocence of our Savior's designs, and of the intellectual nature of that influence and authority which he had endeavored to establish, stands yet on record, to refute those idle accusations of disingenuous men, by which they have represented the religion of Jesus as a contrivance of ambitious impostors, and the spiritual engine of political power. It stands yet on record, to reproach the weakness of Pilate, who, after such a declaration, could yield up the Son of God as a dangerous and seditious enemy of Cæsar, and also as a reproach to the pride and spiritual despotism of many sectaries and princes in the history of the church. It stands yet on record, to encourage and

console the real church of Christ in times of affliction, persecution, apostasy, and decay; for, whether our religion enjoy the favor, or endure the hostility, of the civil powers; whether the kingdoms, which call themselves Christian, are swept away, or extended; whether this globe itself endure, or vanish from the systems of the world, the Prince of Peace is not dethroned, nor his holy dominion destroyed, nor his realm invaded, nor the peace and privileges of his subjects disturbed.

Every religion, which the world, before the coming of Christ, had known, was, more or less, incorporated with established governments. The system of Paganism was altogether civil; the augurs could suspend any proceeding of state, and, at last, the character of priest was invariably united with that of emperor. The religion of Moses, too, was intimately incorporated with his civil polity; and, however the circumcision of the heart only might be recommended by a Christian apostle, no one could ever belong to the Jewish nation, who did not, first, by this outward rite of religious initiation, belong to the Jewish church.

But the religion of Jesus, thanks be to God! was linked with the fortunes of no nation, and wrought into the forms of po government. It interferes with none of the distinctions of political society. It is a religion circumscribed by no natural boundaries, suited to every climate, country, and state of improvement, and adapted to all ages of the world. It has no peculiar exemptions, nor peculiar privileges, for any sex, age, or order of society. In one word, it was designed to be universal and immortal. It has its rudiments only in this world, but its perfection hereafter. The subjects of Christ's kingdom here are a small and distant colony of a mighty empire, placed where their loyalty

is in a state of perpetual probation, to be transplanted successively to the parent country, and to dwell under the more immediate influence of the Prince of Peace, in heaven, the seat of his immediate presence.

Jesus, in his reply to Pilate, who had asked him whether he were a king, adds, in confirmation of the unwarlike nature of the kingdom which he came to establish, "If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have fought, they would not have permitted me to be delivered up to the Jews." Our Savior does not offer this as the only, or the strongest, proof of the spiritual nature of his government, but as one which was evidently suggested by his actual cir

cumstances.

Our Savior's meaning, in the words of our text, undoubtedly, was, that he was, indeed, a king, but that the sway, he should exercise, would be marked by none of the insignia of temporal power, that it would consist in the spiritual influence of his gospel, and the acknowledgment of his authority in the hearts of all his faithful followers, through a long succession of ages; that this world was not the limit of his reign, but that his kingdom would be continued and consummated hereafter.

It shall be our present object, to show you how little the kingdom of Christ resembles, and how little it is connected with, the kingdoms of the world, in its origin, its establishment, its nature, and its duration.

First, then, in its origin. We discern in reality what was so often absurdly claimed by the founders of states, we discern a celestial origin. With what retired and peaceful auguries is it ushered in! In that day, when "the God of heaven" began to "set up a kingdom which should never be destroyed," the world, we are told, was reposing in universal

peace. This spiritual kingdom is introduced, and the states and empires of the earth are undisturbed. In a humble village of Judea, an inconsiderable province of the empire, angels, in the stillness of the midnight air, announce to shepherds the birth of the Prince of Peace, by the song of peace and good-will to men. At the age of thirty years, this Son of God enters publicly, but quietly, and without ostentation, on the business of his mission. At first he is employed in teaching humility to a few ambitious disciples; he is employed in establishing the influence of the most unaspiring religion in hearts the most adverse to its reception; and thus, my friends, is God's minister employed upon earth, during a laborious life. We observe in Jesus no solicitude to swell the number of his adherents by flattering promises, and no care to retain those who, from admiration or curiosity, called themselves his disciples. A ruler comes and falls down before him, professing himself his follower. Our Savior, instead of eagerly embracing him as a valuable acquisition to his cause, proposes a severe test of his sincerity: "Sell all that thou hast, and give it to the poor,... and then come and follow me." The disappointed ruler departs in sorrow, "for," says the evangelist, "he had great possessions." These, however, to a teacher of worldly views, would have been his highest recommendation.

Let us, in the scond place, endeavor to trace the establishment of this kingdom in the world after the death of its founder. You will naturally ask, What provision is made for its continuance and extension? Without doubt, the world would previously suppose that Jesus, like Mahomet, had appointed his successors, given them minute political instructions, and assigned to them their different departments. Perhaps he had directed them to retire, as they

did, from Jerusalem, to avoid the gathering storm, to collect, in silence, their scattered adherents, to wait in secret the increase of their numbers and their strength, and to return, in due time, to avenge the murder of their Master, and to plant the cross on the ruins of the temple. Not a word of all this. Their Lord is crucified, and the disciples are dispersed. The interests of this desperate cause are left, my friends, to the efforts of the men who had fled in panic from Jerusalem. They are left to the untutored eloquence of Peter, that timid disciple who had denied his Master; to the persuasive and affectionate simplicity of the young John; to the fortitude, the zeal, the learning of Paul, who was now, perhaps, sitting at the feet of Gamaliel, smiling at the unsuccessful ministry of Jesus. And yet these are the means by which the kingdom, "that is not of this world," is to be extended. These are the peaceful arms which are to beat down the strong-holds of vice, and spread the triumphs of the cross, and vanquish the lusts and passions and prejudices of an enlightened age.

Observe the circumstances which attended the progress of this kingdom, and you will see that it neither interfered nor was connected with the kingdoms of the world. It threatens not the established power of a single subordinate officer, throughout the Roman empire. It proposes no change in men's civil relations. It may coëxist with any form of government, and any station of society. kingdom of heaven is capacious enough to include the slave chained to his task, and the emperor seated on his throne. It requires not the former to break his fetters, nor the latter to cast away his crown. While it was winning its way through the wide extent of the Roman empire, though the workmen," who made silver shrines for Diana," might have

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