The sins of our unregenerate state should indeed be ever before us; but by frowardness, since we tasted that God is gracious, we sin (as natural men cannot sin) against the heart of Christ, against God's love and His Spirit, who seals us unto the day of redemption. The natural man is a rebel against his Maker; but it is against a Father that we, the saved, offend. Forgetting the cross, we go astray. The remedy is true and speedy confession; for we have an Advocate with the Father. (1 John 2:1.) We must be ever waging war with the secret workings of sin. Where it is but in a little measure allowed, God may suffer His child to go further and further in that allowance, until the seven locks are shorn on Delilah's lap. To be doubting Christ's love, to be limiting His grace, is alike unworthy of us and grieving to Him. The last offence of Joseph's brethren (Gen. 50:15-21) was not the least. There is no fault in our character that the grace of God cannot cure. It becomes us therefore to give no quarter to the Canaanites. (Judges 2) God deals with us after conversion otherwise than before it: He, as a wise Father, has a rod of correction for His children, and smites them when He might let them alone, did they not know His love. Peculiar temptations bring forth peculiar corruptions, after neglected warnings. The Lord Jesus took loving pains to make Peter acquainted with Himself, and was compelled to humble him by his threefold denial of his Lord, but without exposing him to the eye of enemies. Overcome by a sudden temptation, he was quickly forgiven and restored. (Luke 22:55-62.) Whereas David, who had deliberately transgressed, and who had long been in a backsliding state of heart, was exposed to the people as well as made loathsome in his own eyes. (2 Sam. 12; 16) When Christ restores a fallen one, He often makes that disciple stronger than before his fall. "When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren" (Luke 22:32). So it will be with those who, like David and Peter, have been wont to follow the Lord fully. The people of God are in general slack and slothful in searching out sins of ignorance; but if we persevere in the search, asking God to reveal them to us, He will give us very humbling knowledge of ourselves and of our secret faults; with it also blessed comfort and communion, which otherwise we could not enjoy. The Coming of the Lord Yet the blessed hope of the coming of Christ keep us ever on the watchtower; looking, longing for it, and hasting towards it. Would that we duly considered our accountability to Christ, who in the day of His appearing will judge the secrets of all hearts. Then we shall each be called on to give an account of his stewardship - an account, not only of gifts of understanding and substance, but of daily employment, and of all the minutes of the day. (See 1 Cor. 4:1-6.) Prayer