A third important truth taught us by the Messiah being termed the only Begotten of God, is, that he is the object of the supreme love of the Father. A father loves his son, especially his only son. The love of the First person of the Godhead to the Second is expressed by the love which a father has for his son, his only son. "The Father loves the Son." He knows his infinite excellence; and, if I may use the expression, which seems to imply a solecism, up to the infinite measure of his knowledge he loves him. This last idea seems obviously to have been intended to be brought before the mind in the passage under consideration, as what chiefly commends the love of God to the world, is that he gave his only Son to be their Saviour. These, then, are the truths respecting the Messiah taught us by his being termed "the only begotten Son of God."

§ 2. The Son of Man.

The Messiah is described as "the Son of Man."2 This is an appellation which our Lord employs more frequently than any other in speaking of himself, whether in private or public, in the midst of his friends or of his enemies. The phrase, taken by itself, seems just a Hebraism for "man:"In the 4th verse of the 8th Psalm, "What is man that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?" Every one at all acquainted with the use of parallelism in Hebrew composition generally, and especially in Hebrew poetry, must see that "man," and "the son of man," are just equivalent expressions.

To understand its meaning, when used as an appellation of the Messiah, we must turn to a passage in the 80th Psalm, v. 17. "Let thy hand be upon the Man of thy right hand, upon the Son of Man whom thou madest strong for thyself;" the same person who is spoken of in the 15th verse under another of the figurative prophetical appellations of

the Messiah-" the branch" which Jehovah had made strong for himself. In the passage generally referred to as the origin of the appellation, Daniel v. 9, 14, the reference, no doubt, is to the Messiah; but he is there spoken of, not as the Son of Man, but as "one like unto the Son of Man," or having the appearance of a man. While the expression, a son of man, as we have already remarked, is in itself just equivalent to man; the designation," the Son of Man,” at once marks the Messiah, as truly a man, and at the same time, as distinguished from all other men. He is so distinguished in a variety of ways: as the perfect, the normal man-the representative man, the second Adam-the Godman, God manifest in the flesh-and the predicted man, the great subject of Old Testament prophecy.1

§ 3. Sent by the Father.

The Messiah is farther described as "sent by the Father"? -"God sent his Son." In the economy of human redemption, the Father sustains the majesty of the Divinity. He is the fountain of authority, the source of judgment and of mercy. He vindicates the honours of the Divine character, and asserts the rights of the Divine government; and he, too, dispenses pardon and salvation in a way consistent with the illustration of these honours, and the maintenance of these rights. While essentially the Father and the Son are one in the economy of grace, the Father is greater than the Son. He invests him with the character of Mediator and Saviour; he qualifies him for the discharge of its duties; he supports him under its labours and difficulties; and he rewards him for the accomplishment of the work given him to do.

When the Father is said to have sent the Son, the meaning is, that Jesus Christ was divinely authorised and com

For a full illustration of this descriptive appellation, vide Sermon I., appended to the first edition of Expository Discourses on the First Epistle of Peter. 2 John iii. 17.

missioned to act as the Saviour of the world; to do and suffer all that was necessary for the attainment of the salvation of man, in accordance with the perfections of the Divine character, and the principles of the Divine government. Such is the view given us of the Messiah in these words of our Lord—a person uniting in himself the natures of God and man, and divinely appointed to effect the salvation of mankind.

II. OF THE DESIGN OF THE MESSIAH'S MISSION.

The next topic to which our attention must be directed, is the design of the Messiah's mission. That is described in various ways, all of them having a reference to the false views of the design of the Messiah's mission entertained by the Jews. It is described negatively: He was sent "not to condemn the world." Then it is described positively: First generally" to save the world;"1 and then more particularly, to deliver them from the greatest possible evil -"that they might not perish ;" and to raise them to the enjoyment of the greatest good-" that they might have everlasting life." Let us shortly consider the meaning of these various descriptions of the design of the Messiah's mission.

§ 1. Negatively, not to condemn the world.

The design of the Messiah's mission was not to condemn or punish "the world." "The world" here is obviously to be understood, as the Jews used the term, of all mankind, with the exception of themselves, the holy nation. They expected that the Messiah was to deliver the people of Israel, and to punish and destroy the Gentile nations. The deliverance of Israel, and the punishment of the nations, were to them ideas closely connected, and both were to be the work

VOL I.

1 John iii. 17.

2 John iii. 15, 17.

B

of the Messiah. One of their principal doctors, explaining the illustrious prophecy in the 49th chapter of Genesis, “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and to him shall the gathering of the people be," says, 'The sense seems to me to be "The rod of the oppressor shall not depart from Judah, till his Son come, who shall overthrow the nations and break them in pieces, and make war on them all with the edge of the sword." Another Rabbi says, "When the Messiah comes he shall be as the morning light to Israel, but he shall be as night to the nations of the earth." Such views seem to have been universal among the Jews at the time of our Lord's appearance, as they are still among their unbelieving descendants.

§ 2. Positively, to save the world.

Now, says our Lord, the design of the Messiah's mission is not the punishment of the Gentile nations-it is not the punishment of men at all. He comes not to punish, but to save; and to save, not Israelites merely, but men of every country, and people, and tongue, and nation. He is sent "to save the world;" to deliver mankind, Gentiles as well as Jews, from the evils under which they are groaning. He comes, not to bring evils on men, but to remove evils from them to deliver them from ignorance, and error, and guilt, and depravity, and wretchedness, in all their various forms.

(1.) That the world may not perish.

But the design of the Messiah's mission is more particularly described: he comes that mankind " may not perish,”— that they may be delivered from the greatest of all evils. The evils, the removal of which his mission contemplated, are not the external and temporary evils which press on one nation, or even on the whole race, but the spiritual and eternal, and therefore irreparable evils, to which all mankind

are subject. Man, whether Jew or Gentile, is a sinner. He has broken God's law. He has incurred God's displeasure. He is a depraved as well as a guilty creature; "alienated from the life of God, through the ignorance that is in him," sunk in ignorance and error, and moral pollution of every description; and because he is guilty and depraved, he is miserable, exposed to numerous external evils, and destitute of all real inward happiness. And this state of things, so far as man's own exertions are concerned, so far as the exertions of the whole created universe are concerned, is irreparable. He must sink deeper and deeper in guilt, and depravity, and misery. If the ordinary course of the Divine government be maintained, he must be "punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power." His immortality of being must be an immortality of unmixed intolerable wretchedness. To deliver men, not men of one particular nation, but men of every nation, from this tremendous aggregation of evils, was the design of the Messiah's mission.

1

(2.) That the world may have eternal life.

But mere deliverance does not form the sole purpose of the mission of the Son of God. He comes that men might have everlasting life. "Life,” though not directly signifying enjoyment, according to the Hebrew idiom, conveys more strongly than any other word the idea of happiness, as "death" does that of misery. Everlasting life is of course ever-during happiness. The happiness of a being like man, consists in the Divine favour, and image, and fellowship; in knowing God, in loving God, in being loved by God, in knowing that we are loved by God, in venerating God, trusting in God; having our mind conformed to his mind, our wishes subjected to his pleasure, thinking along with him, willing along with him, choosing what he chooses,

12 Thess. i. 9.