And by belief _I gain my victories_. "Who is he that overcometh ... but he that believeth?" It is not by flashing armour that we beat the devil, but by an invincible life. On these battlefields a mystic breath does more destruction than all our fine and costly expedients. To believe is to obtain the winning spirit, and every battle brings its trophies to our feet. And by belief _I gain assurance_. "He that believeth ... hath the witness in him." So many Christians fight in doubt and indecision, and their uncertainty impairs their strength and skill. It is the man who can quietly say "I know" who is terrible in battle and who drives his foes in confusion from the field. JULY The Twenty-eighth _ALL THINGS NEW!_ 2 CORINTHIANS v. 14-21. Here is a new constraint! "The love of Christ constraineth me." The love of Christ _carries me along like a crowd_. I am taken up in its mighty movement and swept along the appointed road! Or it _arrests me_, and makes me its willing prisoner. It lays a strong hand upon me, and I have no option but to go. A gracious "necessity is laid upon me." _I must!_ And here is a new world. "_Old things are passed away._" The man who is the prisoner of the Lord's love will find himself in new and wonderful scenery. Everything will wear a new face--God, man, self, the garden, the sky, the sea! We shall look at all things through love-eyes, and it is amazing in what new light a great love will set familiar things! Commonplaces become beautiful when looked at through the lens of Christian love. When we "walk in love" our eyes are anointed with "the eye-salve" of grace. And here is a new service. "We are ambassadors ... for Christ." When we see our Lord through love-eyes, and then our brother, we shall yearn to serve our brother in Christ. We shall intensely long to tell the love-story of the Lord our Saviour. What we have seen, with confidence we tell. JULY The Twenty-ninth _NAMES AND NATURES_ ROMANS viii. 1-10. Men will recognize my Christianity by the sign of the Spirit of Christ. And they will accept no other witness. I saw a plant-pot the other day, full of soil, bearing no flower, but flaunting a stick on which was printed the word "Mignonette." "Thou hast a name to live and art dead." The world will take no notice of our labels and our badges: it is only arrested by the flower and the perfume. "If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His." And in the Spirit of Christ I shall best deal with "_the things of the flesh_." There are some things which are best overcome by neglecting them. To give them attention is to give them nourishment. Withdraw the attention, and they sicken and die. And so I must seek the fellowship of the Spirit. That friendship will destroy the other. "Ye cannot serve God and Mammon." If I am in communion with the Holy One the other will pine away, and cease to trouble me.