"THE LAW AND THE PROPHETS."
By T.
"THEREFORE all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the prophets." Matt. 7:12. The foregoing scripture is called the "Golden Rule," and by many it is supposed to be purely and solely a New Testament precept. But in repeating this "golden" truth to the multitude in His Sermon on the Mount, the Master said, "This is the law and the prophets." Men may not have been able, because of their narrowness and prejudices, to see the "Golden Rule" in "the law and the prophets,"—the Old Testament Scriptures,—but the Lord could see it there clearly. He announces it, not as some new truth that had never been discovered before, but as the sum and substance of "the law and the prophets." Now since the Saviour can find such wonderful and helpful truth in the Old Testament, is it not highly important that we should study it diligently; for He has given us the promise of His Spirit to guide us into all truth? And as we study His entire Word, not merely the New Testament, but the Old Testament as well, the Spirit which searcheth the deep things of God will bring to our minds the gems of truth. The Old Testament presents the coming of the great Sacrifice for sin. It gives the types and shadows of the life, and work, and efficacy of Heaven's priceless gift to humanity. The New Testament spreads before us the life of the Master in all the perfection in which He lived it. The significance of the prophecies that were fulfilled in the life of Jesus can not be seen except as we study those prophecies themselves in the Old Testament Scriptures. And since the7Saviour studied the "law and the prophets," is it not pleasant to think of following Him in the same studies? T.