their way, and not in Christ’s, was also the hour of the power of darkness.  That was what they had gained by having their own way; by saying—­The kingdom is ours, and not God’s.  They had fallen under the power of darkness, not of light.  The very light within them was darkness.  They utterly mistook their road on earth.  At the very moment that they were trying to make peace with the Roman governor, by denying that Christ was their King, and demanding that He should be crucified,—­at that very moment the things which belonged to their peace were hid from their eyes.  Never men made so fatal a mistake, when they thought themselves most politic and prudent.  They said among themselves—­’Unless we put down this man, the Romans will come and take away our place,’ i.e. our privileges, and power, and our nation.  And what followed?  That the Romans did come and take away their place and nation, with horrible massacre and ruin:  and so they lost both the kingdom of this world, and the kingdom of God likewise.  Never, I say, did men make a more fatal mistake in the things of this world than those Jews to whom the kingdom of God came, and they rejected it.

And so shall we, my friends, if we forget that, whether we like it or not, the kingdom of God is within us, and we within it likewise.

1.  The kingdom of God is within us.  Every gracious motive, every noble, just, and merciful instinct within us, is a sign to us that the kingdom of God is come to us; that we are not as the brutes which perish; not as the heathen who are too often past feeling, being alienated from the life of God by reason of the ignorance which is in them:  but, that we are God’s children, inheritors of the kingdom of heaven; and that God’s Spirit is teaching us the laws of that kingdom; so that in every child who is baptized, educated, and civilized, is fulfilled the promise, ’I will write my laws upon their hearts, and I will be to them a Father.’

God’s Spirit is teaching our hearts as He taught the heart of that old Eastern king.  It may be, it ought to be, that He is teaching us far deeper lessons than He ever taught that king.

2.  We are in the kingdom of God.  It is worth our while to remember that steadfastly just now.  Many people are ready to agree that the kingdom of God is within them.  They will readily confess that religion is a spiritual matter, and a matter of the heart:  but their fancy is that therefore religion, and all just and noble and beautiful instincts and aspirations, are very good things for those who have them:  but that, if any one has them not, it does not much matter.