SOME BOOKS OF THE WEEK.
[Under Me hemline we notice sash Books of the week as have not bees reserved for review in other forms.] Expositions of Holy Scripture. By Alexander Maclaren, D.D. (Hodder and Stoughton. Is. 6d.)—Dr. Maclaren has completed his first series of these "Expositions,"—six volumes contain- ing Genesis, Isaiah i.-xlviii. and xlix.-lxvi., and St. Matthew (3 vols.) He now begins a second series. The two volumes before us contain the Gospel of St. Mark, and will be continued with the Acts I. and the remaining books of the Hexateuch, with the historical books of the Old Testament in two volumes. We wish the author health and strength to carry on and complete this admirable work. We may quote what he says about the Eucharist :— " The Passover was a family festival, and that characteristic passes over to the Lord's Supper. Christ is not only the food on which we feed, but the Head of the family and distributor of the banquet. He is the feast and the Governor of the feast, and all who sit at that table are 'brethren.' One, life is in them all, and they are one as partakers of One. The Lord's Supper is a visible symbol of the Christian life, which should not only be all lived in remembrance of Him, but consists in partaking by faith of His life, and incorporating it in ours, until we come to the measure of perfect men, which, in one aspect, we reach when we can say, 'I live; yet not I, but Christ Booth in me.' There is a prophetic element, as well as a commemorative and symbolic, in the Lord's Supper, which is prominent in Christ's closing words. Ho does not partake of the symbols which He gives ; but there comes a time, in that perfected form of the kingdom, when perfect love shall make all the citizens perfectly conformed to the perfect will of God. Then, whatsoever associations of joy, of invigoration, of festal fellowship, clustered round the wine-cup here, shall be heightened, purified, and perpetuated in the calm raptures of the heavenly feast, in which He will be Partaker, as well as Giver and Food. ' Thou shalt make them drink of the river of Thy pleasures.' The King's lips will touch the golden cup filled with unlearning wine, ere He commends it to His guests. And from that feast they will ' go no more out,' neither shall the triumphant music of its great ' hymn' be followed by any Olivet or Gethsemane, or any denial, or any Calvary ; but there shall be ' no more sorrow, nor sin, nor death '; for 'the former things are passed away,' and He has made 'all things new.'"
Previous page
