But further: the facts have been fully proved, that God Jehovah, by taking a personal interest in the well-being of the Israelites, and labouring to secure their redemption, secured their affections to himself; and that his acts of mercy produced this effect was manifested by their song after their final deliverance at the Red Sea. 'I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously: the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea. The Lord is my strength and song, and he is become my salvation.' In like manner, Jesus Christ secured to himself, in a greater degree, the affections of Christians, by his self-denying life and death, to ransom them from spiritual bondage and misery. The Israelites in Egypt were under a temporal law so severe, that while they suffered in the greatest degree, they could not fulfil its requirements: they therefore loved Jehovah for temporal deliverance. The believer was under a spiritual law, the requirements of which he could not fulfil, and therefore he loved Christ for spiritual deliverance. This fact, that the supreme affection of believers was thus fixed upon Christ, and fixed upon him in view of his self-sacrificing love for them, is manifest throughout the whole New Testament--even more manifest than that the Jews loved Jehovah for temporal deliverance. 'The love of Christ constraineth us,' says one: thus manifesting that his very life was actuated by affection for Jesus. Says another--speaking of early Christians generally--'Whom [Christ] having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.' The Bible requires religious men to perform religious duties, moved by love to Christ: 'And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not unto men; knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance: for ye serve the Lord Christ.' Mark--these Christians were moved in what they did, what they said, and what they felt, by love to Christ: love to Jesus actuated their whole being, body and soul. It governed them.