value of a sacrifice depends on the degree in which it glorifies God; and nothing can glorify him more than his own peculiar glory: now, this divine glory was in the sacrifice of Christ, and so it is of infinite value, and is therefore infinitely sufficient for sinners. It is therefore impossible that my guilt can transcend this value of atonement, and therefore I flee from all my sin to that sacrifice as greater still. When the mountains of my transgression are cast into this ocean of sacrificial value, then do I know something of the greatness of God, more than all nature can teach. Apprehend this truth, that the vicarious death of Christ is infinite in value, and you have risen far up into the rock of eternal security! 4. The sacrifice of Christ is an ordinance of God, and therefore sure and valid as a ground of trust. God alone, who has been sinned against, can have any right to institute the mode of forgiveness; and this is that medium which he has ordained, even the sacrifice of Christ. "HIM hath God set forth to be a propitiation for sin, through faith in his blood." "Christ crucified, the power of God unto salvation, to every one that believeth." From the beginning of the world, the future sacrifice of the seed of the woman" was presented to men as the divine ordinance for pardon; and the whole Jewish economy, with its innumerable sacrifices of blood, was but a sacrificial forerunner of the "Lamb of God who taketh away the sin of the world." Is not the sun the ordinance of God for light, by which alone you expect to see? Is not air the ordinance for breath; and are not bread and water the ordinances for hunger and thirst? Even so is Christ sacrificed, the divine ordinance for eternal life to sinful man. Do you hesitate to receive the light of the sun, to inhale the air of the firmament, or to eat the bread and to drink the water of this earth? Nay, and why then hesitate to accept and appropriate the sacrifice of Christ, as sure and free an ordidinance of God as any one of the others? Will you not for yourself believe and say, - What God hath appointed, is not that sufficient? What God hath declared to be his own ordinance, shall I not trust to as my hope and fixed security?" Go, my dear friend, and cling to the cross of Christ; and if conscience or the world say, why doest thou so-let thing answer be, This is the ordinance of my God; he against whom I have sinned hath said, thus shalt thou be forgiven!" It is a source of glory to God, now to administer the sacrifice that was offered in the death of Christ, so that sinners may be pardoned and saved through it. For, as this is the ordinance of God, so it is for his glory, as the author of it, that it be honored. When men believe in Christ crucified, they glorify God, even as when they keep his holy law, or observe his righteous commands; and hence a man has the same inducement to believe in Christ, which he has to do any good action whatever. In man's fallen state, this is the most honoring thing which he can perform;-yea, it is the very first that he can do, contributing to the glory of his Lord. What an obligation of encouragement therefore is there in this circumstance to induce you as a sinner to identify yourself with Christ's sacrifice? When can you ever present such a righteousness as his; when, such a sacrifice as his? When can you glorify God, as God hath glorified himself? Can you ever satisfy the justice of God, and yet be a vessel of his mercy? Can you ever manifest God's hatred of sin in your punishment, and yet also bring honor to him as a monument of his grace? Can you magnify him in the pains of hell, and afterwards praise him in the joys of heaven? Can you magnify the law by suffering its eternal penalty, and then make it honorable by its everlasting fulfilment? Nay, these things you cannot do-but Christ hath done them-and he that receives him, receives all that was done by him;-and so, that man being partner by gift in Christ's work and sacrifice, presents an endless source of glory to God by faith in his beloved Son, our kinsman Redeemer. Oh what a splendid inducement is this to believe in the sacrifice of Christ and to rely on his all-sufficient atonement; that a finite creature, a wretched sinner, can thereby honor the holy God to infinity! Herein is a mystery-How shall the finite contribute the infinite? Even by faith, participating in the righteousness of Immanuel, God with us! 6. Behold here the basis of Peace between God and man. Doth God breathe war, when he gave his own Son to be crucified for his enemies? Will he not be reconciled, seeing that Jesus hath become a sacrifice for us? What is requisite for securing peace? Has the law been broken? Behold it fulfilled! Has the curse been entailed? behold it endured! Has the character of God been dishonored? Behold it infinitely glorified! God, the offended hath begun; shall not man, the offender follow? The reconciliation has commenced with him that is supreme;-shall not the low and the base, press in for the pardon? The sacrifice is slain-" Peace," is its name; for, "Christ is our peace;❞—and will you not lay your hand on his head, and live? Be not afraid to rely on him who is the Prince and the sacrifice of peace —who died to purchase, and lives to dis- | universal—it is individual—it is to me—oh pense it; but rather, in the gospel hear the yes, to ME!" Blessed be God-blessed trumpet of peace sweetly sounding the be Christ! Blessed be the Holy Ghost notes of reconciliation-yield to the joyful who hath shewn it to me! Oh happy, sound-accept the peace, and be at rest. happy I, who have such an offer made;Oh what peace is that! No more curse, but happier, happier I, who can say now, no more hell, no more wrath, no more "the Lord Jesus Christ is become my scourge, no more deadly execution-all, sacrifice for sin!" all, the Peace of God"-sweet, mighty, eternal peace! 7. The universal presentation of this sacrifice is a circumstance which ought to secure your individual acceptance. There is virtue in it for every one;-and to every one is the offer made-why then should any one doubt? You have just as good reason from the gospel to embrace the sacrifice of Christ, for your own salvation, as if an angel from heaven carried the message from the eternal throne, and read it in your astonished ears. You have an offer, my dear friend, of this atonement to become your own; that offer existed before your appearance in the world-it awaited your birth-it reached you in early life-it has attended you till this hour-it is renewed in this page. What have you done with it? Is the gift accepted? the glorious sacrifice of Christ become yours? Are you justified by its merit? Are you living on Christ's death? Does he seem the loveliest of beings to you, in laying down his life for you? If you can refuse argument, can you get rid of an offer? Although you may reject reasoning, can you cast away a gift? "This is the record, that God giveth us eternal life, and that life is in his Son!" This gives you an individual right to trust in Christ, and this also lays upon you a divine obligation which you cannot violate without awful guilt. Has My subject is not exhausted, my friend, but my limits are exceeded:-yet I trust, not without your finding some food for meditation, and it may be also, for the exercise of faith. Indulge in thought on the subject, in occasional abrupt thought, as well as in steadfast train. Say in your heart," It is true-it is real-it is human-it is divine-it is ordained-it is I have said nothing special of that love which was the soul of Christ's atonement; because that was fully illustrated in a former letter:-neither have I specified the grace of the Holy Spirit, as coming to us by Christ's death, this being rather a result of the sacrifice, than an element of its constitution. Yet, let me beseech you to remember that whilst in this matter God has to himself been strict justice, he has to us been love—so that we have every thing to attract, and nothing to repel us. And let me also remind you, that the Holy Spirit, who is sent on the basis of Christ's sacrifice, alone can introduce us into its benefits. He unites in faith the mind of man, and the word of God;-he unites, too, the soul of the sinner, and the sacrifice of the Savior, that they become one. The Spirit reveals the Son, and the Son reveals the Father; and so these three are one in the believer's heart, even as in heaven. Let your soul dwell on the love of God, and the glory of God-head in the sacrifice of Christ; and the Eternal Spirit will spread forth his gracious energy over you, and cause faith, and love, and hope, and joy, gradually to spring up within you; until you can with understanding say, "I am crucified with Christ;-nevertheless, I live;-yet, not I, but Christ liveth in me:-and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loveth me, and gave himself for me!" Again, for the present, farewell! I may write you soon again if at leisure. Meanwhile, remember the Savior, and his sacrifice! We have much to try us, and much to busy us, from day to day; so will it be until death;-but, under the shadow of the cross, there is peace, there is rest. God be ever with you to bless you and yours. American Baptist Board of Foreign Missions. THE ACTING BOARD. from the meeting; and several, now members of the Acting Board, have served as members more than fifteen years. The responsibilities of the Board are very great. The business which invites the deliberations of the Board, is of the most serious and weighty character. Our missions are established in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa, as well as among the Aborigines of our own country, and in a great variety of nations. To exercise a judicious supervision over these missions, requires a vast amount of knowledge. If suitable men are selected as missionaries, and we believe the Board have been hitherto singularly successful in this respect, very much can be confided to them; still, there will be occasion for the Board to be well informed concerning the civil relations of various countries, where their missions are, or are to be established; their commercial relations, climate, laws, manners and customs, religion, degree of civilization, language, &c. &c. All this is necessary to a judicious selection of a missionary station, or to the exercise of an enlightened judgment in adopting a station that might be selected by missionaries; and also, to an economical and expeditious performance of the business in procuring and transmitting sup We design, in a few remarks, to invite attention to the relations and responsibilities of the Acting Board. We have before shown by whom and in what manner the Board is chosen. A new Board is created every third year. The constitution of the Convention requires that it shall consist of a President, Vice Presidents, Secretaries, Treasurer, Assistant Treasurer, and forty Managers, with the President and Secretaries of the Convention. At the late meeting of the Convention, the number of Vice Presidents to be chosen, according to previous agreement, was eighteen, making the entire number of the Board sixty-four. Immediately after its election, the Board met and appointed fifteen of its number, living in and near the city of Boston, seven of whom constitute a quorum,-to transact all business during the ensuing year, whose proceedings are to be reported at the annual meeting of the Board. The number thus selected, are called the "Acting Board," which, in other words, is a committee, invested with authority to act in the name and on the behalf of the whole body. The same thing has been done, in fact, ever since the Board has had an existence. The question of convenience has generally determined the place of meet-plies. ing, and whatever members have resided in the vicinity of the meeting have been accustomed to attend, and transact the business. The present form is preferable; certain individuals are appointed, and are held responsible for a faithful performance of the business. Besides many special meetings and much labor performed by committees, the Acting Board holds a regular monthly meeting, which all the members feel under a special obligation to attend. These meetings occupy ordinarily the whole day. All the members, except the Secretaries, whose entire service is given to the Board, labor gratuitously, and defray their own travelling expenses to and The Board are called upon to judge of the qualifications of missionaries; and very grave consequences are involved in a suitable or unsuitable discharge of this branch of their duty. A congregation in a Christian land, where every thing is inviting, and where candidates are numerous, often find it to be a difficult thing to procure a suitable supply; and how much more difficult must it be for the Board to procure a supply for a field much less inviting, lying many thousand miles off, and with which they themselves, from the nature of the case, can be but partially acquainted. There may be openings for missionary labor, and the public may call for an in crease of missionaries, while as yet the Board may not have discovered the men that seem adapted to their service. Again, openings for missionary labor may have occurred, and the suitable men may be ready, yet the Board may not have the means of sending them. For the right disposition of all these various questions, the Board are held responsible. The relation of the Board to their missionaries is delicate and important, involving very great responsibilities. The missionary, on entering the service of the Board, relinquishes all hope of acquiring earthly possessions; he leaves his country and his kindred, and goes far away from both, to dwell among the heathen, and thus places himself in a condition of dependency upon the Board for his sustenance, and for the means necessary to the accomplishment of his reasonable expectations as a missionary among the heathen; a service to which he feels himself shut up by his convictions of duty. This relation awakens in the Board the feelings of the greater solicitude, from the fact that it cannot be subjected to the rigorous exactions of a written contract, but must be regulated by the principles of the gospel, which take it for granted that each party is disposed to do the thing that is right and proper. To cherish a becoming sympathy, and provide suitably for the ever returning wants of some fifty or a hundred families, must engross no small share of attention; but this service is light compared with that necessary to be bestowed on the great enterprize in which the missionary is engaged, and in which he has a right to expect that he will be sustained. The Board feel bound to listen attentively to every proposition from their missionaries, that aims at giving enlargement and efficiency to their operations, and to second their endeavors to this end by every means in their power. To do this is but the fulfilment of their most sacred pledge; and it has been one of the greatest sources of anxiety to the Board, that they have not been able to meet such expectations. Almost every mission is at this moment suffering for the want of a reinforcement. In confirmation of this, we have only to refer to the statements of our missionaries, and their often repeated appeals published in the Magazine. Specimens of this sort are found in the present number, in the notes of Mr. Mason, of the Tavoy mission, and in the letter of Mr. Goddard, of the Siam mission. Mr. Mason, having stated some reasons why he supposed that the See of Rome had its eye on the Karens, as a field of missionary labor, remarks :— rens. "I am astonished at the apathy of American Christians in respect to the KaWe ought to have six more missionaries at work among them at this moment, in these provinces alone. The Christians are scattered hither and thither uninstructed, their children are growing up in ignorance for the want of teachers, and the great proportion of the unconverted do not hear the gospel from January to December, year after year. Yet so hopeless is the prospect of doing any good by mentioning the subject, that I have more than once hesitated when writing this letter, in doubt whether to finish it or not. I think I should have thrown it aside altogether, had not Ezek. 3: 18, 19, come to my mind. I have delivered my soul." Almost every despatch from our missionaries contains some touching appeal for help. They speak on behalf of their brother missionaries, on behalf of native Christians, on behalf of millions who worship idols. Nor can the Board be indifferent to the claims of either of these parties. They could not feel indifferent, were they to contemplate them in their individual capacity. Every man, whose soul has been animated by the hopes of the gospel, must feel with an Apostle, that he is debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians," to communicate to them a knowledge of that which he has found so beneficial to himself, and which he knows is needed by them, and is equally adapted to them. And more especially is the Board moved by a consideration of these claims, when they remember that thousands of their Christian brethren are confiding in them, that, as the almoners of their bounty, they will listen attentively to these entreaties, and supply those wants, or inform them of their inability to do so. In what we have remarked hitherto upon this subject, we have directed our attention, ish its resources. The grounds of objecexclusively to the foreign field of labor; tion are various. Some maintain that an and it will be obvious, we think, from the association embracing both extremes of brief sketch which we have drawn, that the Union, must necessarily be accessory the Board would have sufficient to com- to the perpetuity of sectional evils; others, pletely engross their attention were they that if the wicked are allowed to cast into allowed to confine it exclusively to this de- the common treasury, the displeasure of partment. In other words, the Board Heaven must consequently rest upon the would find sufficient employment in super- whole institution; others again complain intending the work of foreign missions, if of the administration of the Board as being the means necessary for prosecuting them, inefficient, and that it squanders the funds were furnished without their care. But in needless expenditures. These grounds every one knows that this is not the fact. of objection are urged with great freedom, It is known that the greatest obstacles to in a variety of forms. Though the Board the progress of foreign missions lie in thts are generally aware of the sources of these direction; that the labor of collecting the things, and know how to appreciate them, requisite funds far exceeds all others. This they are nevertheless occasion of deep rewill probably continue to be the case. gret; for every scheme brought forward, The supporters of this enterprize are multi- be it ever so absurd, will have advocates; tudinous, and are dispersed over an im- and every pretender, however worthless, mensely wide surface of territory. They will have followers, and thereby many of must, nevertheless, all be approached; the the unwary are seduced from the simplicity facts in the case must be communicated, of the truth; and this is the more to be reso that every one may have the means of gretted because every substraction from forming an intelligent judgment; the heart our strength, by whatever means made, must also be moved to the duty of evange- inflicts a blow which falls ultimately upon lizing the heathen, by a presentation of our missions. This is quickly perceived those motives which the gospel furnishes. and most keenly felt by the Board, for It is, doubtless, the duty of every disciple they cannot but be tenderly alive to the of Christ to do something for the conver- interests of the missions entrusted to their sion of heathen nations, yet one may live care. It were indeed monstrous to feel and die in the neglect of this duty, and so otherwise. A most vivid picture of the may thousands; whole communities may missions is kept constantly impressed upon neglect this duty, as has often been the the mind, and they would that the same case, and as always will be the case until were impressed on every other mind. some influence is exerted upon the people When assembled for prayerful deliberation, to move them to the performance of it. communication after communication is These difficulties arise from the nature of read to them from the missionaries, so full the case, and are incident to every organ- of interest that their feelings often become ization for missionary purposes. There wrought up to the highest pitch of endurare also other obstacles which our Board ance. They come, it may be, from differhave to meet, some of which arise from ent continents, and from missions in a great the nature of the civil institutions of the variety of conditions, from the highest country; some from the peculiarities of our measure of prosperity to the lowest depths previous history; and some from the nature of adversity. Some are in prison, perhaps, of our ecclesiastical polity. being persecuted for righteousness' sake; There are many influences adverse to the some are sick, and nigh unto death. Othcause of missions among us, that furnishers again are giving thanks to God that occasion for deep regret. There are not they have been enabled to complete a wanting those who feel at liberty to assail translation of his Word into a language the Board in a manner calculated to destroy spoken by millions of benighted and perpublic confidence, and, of course, to diminishing heathen; others, being surrounded |