above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. SERMONS. SERMON I. CHRISTMAS DAY. ST. JOHN i. 14. The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. THE blessed apostle St. Paul, endowed with extraordinary communications of the Holy Spirit, could yet, upon surveying the duties of his office, exclaim, "Who is sufficient for these things?" If religion were not extended beyond the bounds of some who reject the mysterious parts of Christianity, even then to B call men to the love of God, and of one another, would require an unusual degree of every grace that can adorn our nature, and commend the truth. But to impress upon men's minds the inexcusableness of that guilt which despises the Son of God; to show forth the extent of that gratitude and obedience which we owe as redeemed children of God; to unfold the love of Christ, who died for us when we were yet enemies to God and to him, or ignorant of him, are offices which angels could not adequately magnify, and which leave far behind the perfection of apostles and martyrs. What is all preaching, whether by word or by example, if set beside this one truth, "the Word was made flesh ?" "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." He is God who was made flesh. Let us not ask, how can these things be? He is from eternity: we are of the earth; born to die and to go into a world of which we know but little beyond its existence. How then can man by searching find out God? Our safety is in trusting to him, in depending upon his word, and in asking his help. What is God? He is our Father and our Lord; we are his creatures, his poor, his sinful, and his dependent children. Let us be satisfied with this knowledge of God. "The word was God." The nearest that we can reach toward the understanding of this title, The Word, is, that through the Son of God, the Father revealed his will to men from the first, in paradise, to Abraham on Mount Moriah, in the wilderness to Moses, in the cloud in the temple, and lastly, in our nature, by the Word being made flesh. "No man hath seen God at any time. The only begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him." "He that hath seen me," saith Christ, hath seen the Father." |