It is even so with the believer when he forsakes the world of sin and vanity, and sets out on a Christian life. He hears a call from God, like that which Abraham heard when he left his country and his kinsmen for another land which God would show him. The invitations and commands of Christ prompt him to give up the world. Were it not for such a call he would live and die in his natural state of sin. No inward promptings of his own; no feelings of dissatisfaction with his present condition; no mere natural longings and aspirations, however deep felt, would move him to an earnest outlook beyond the present vanity, and to a heartfelt separation from the seen and the temporal which is around him. But when the external call of the gospel is attended by the internal call of the Holy Spirit, he feels a quickening power; he hears and obeys the divine command. Faith in the Redeemer leads him to obedience. He quits the world; he tears himself away from its deceitful charms, and consents to follow Christ. 2. I speak of their destination as expressed in the command of the Master. It was, "_The other side_." They set sail, not for a short excursion along the coast, or an evening trip off from the mainland, and then to return; but across the sea to another country and a different shore. The words of the Master point onward, onward beyond the billows to the far-off land. To "the other side" is the sailing order by which the disciples set their helm and trim their sail; to "the other side" they point while they loose from their moorings at Capernaum, and say good-by to the fishermen left behind upon the beach. And is there not another side to our existence than the one we are now on? Is there not some shining shore beyond this one--beyond the billows, beyond the cloud-banks; something, if not discernible by our sense vision, at least discoverable by faith? _This side_ is familiar enough to us. We have trodden it and explored it; we know its features--a state of sin and disappointment, of temptations and illusions, a thousand vanities and shams; life ofttimes seeming a chaos of contradictions, pleasures glittering, syrens singing, sorrows brooding, hopes decaying. "_This side_" where we are is a strange side, a dim, dubious shore, where tides ebb and flow we know not how; where the mirage plays upon our vision, and fills the atmosphere with phantoms which seem to us realities; where we seek for happiness in vain, till death removes us from the fitful, toilsome scene.