‘Watch ye.’  That means one of two things certainly, probably both—­Keep awake, and keep your eyes open.  Our Lord used the same metaphor, you remember, very frequently, but with a special significance.  On His lips it generally referred to the attitude of expectation of His coming in judgment.  Paul uses sometimes the figure with the same application, but here, distinctly, it has another.  As I said, there is the military idea underlying it.  What will become of an army if the sentries go to sleep?  And what chance will a Christian man have of doing his devoir against his enemy, unless he keeps himself awake, and keeps himself alert?  Watchfulness, in the sense of always having eyes open for the possible rush down upon us of temptation and evil, is no small part of the discipline and the duty of the Christian life.  One part of that watchfulness consists in exercising a very rigid and a very constant and comprehensive scrutiny of our motives.  For there is no way by which evil creeps upon us so unobserved, as when it slips in at the back door of a specious motive.  Many a man contents himself with the avoidance of actual evil actions, and lets any kind of motives come in and out of his mind unexamined.  It is all right to look after our doings, but ‘as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.’  The good or the evil of anything that I do is determined wholly by the motive with which I do it.  And we are a great deal too apt to palm off deceptions on ourselves to make sure that our motives are right, unless we give them a very careful and minute scrutiny.  One side of this watchfulness, then, is a habitual inspection of our motives and reasons for action.  ‘What am I doing this for?’ is a question that would stop dead an enormous proportion of our activity, as if you had turned the steam off from an engine.  If you will use a very fine sieve through which to strain your motives, you will go a long way to keeping your actions right.  We should establish a rigid examination for applicants for entrance, and make quite sure that each that presents itself is not a wolf in sheep’s clothing.  Make them all bring out their passports.  Let every vessel that comes into your harbour remain isolated from all communication with the shore, until the health officer has been on board and given a clean bill.  ’Watch ye,’ for yonder, away in the dark, in the shadow of the trees, the black masses of the enemy are gathered, and a midnight attack is but too likely to bring a bloody awakening to a camp full of sleepers.

My text goes on to bring the enemy nearer and nearer and nearer.  ’Watch ye’—­and if, not unnoticed, they come down on you, ’stand fast in the faith.’  There will be no keeping our ranks, or keeping our feet—­or at least, it is not nearly so likely that there will be—­unless there has been the preceding watchfulness.  If the first command has not been obeyed, there is small chance of the second’s being so.  If there has not been any watchfulness, it is not at all likely