deepest gratitude, and our most lively praise? This
is a day on which it is our happiness and our
privilege to celebrate the great and glorious event of
our Redeemer's birth. It is my intention therefore
to offer on the subject some general observations,
which may with propriety be founded on the text.
"Now the birth of Christ was on this wise."
These words will lead us to consider,

I. The pre-existence of Jesus Christ.
II. His miraculous conception.

III. His birth.

IV. His character as Emmanuel, God with us. I. We are to notice the pre-existence of Jesus Christ.

We need not inquire after any condition, in which we ourselves were placed previously to our birth; for this is evidently our first state of being. The Pythagorean notion of man's existence in another state, anterior to his present life, is a fanciful speculation opposed to universal experience, and not warranted by either reason or scripture. But the declarations of the word of God, respecting Jesus Christ, clearly prove that he was possessed of a glorious being before he took on him our nature by his incarnation. He was sent into the world as the Father's messenger. He came down from heaven and clothed himself with humanity. Jesus speaks of his "glory with the Father, before the world was. And the apostle asserts, “That he was in the form of God, and thought it not robbery to be equal with God; but that he made himself of no reputation, and took

been free from original sin nor from the peccable nature of man, had he been born in the natural way from sinful parents. His body therefore was formed by the immediate agency of the Holy Ghost. The Saviour, therefore, although a perfect man, was entirely without sin in his conception and birth, as well as in his life and death.

But the necessity of man's case essentially required that Christ should be God as well as man. Otherwise how could he have saved us? His atonement must necessarily be of a divine character and of infinite value. Otherwise how could it be a "full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world?" His power, also must be infinite; otherwise how could he attend to the miseries, the wants, and the necessities of all the millions of his redeemed? How could he give rest to the weary and heavy laden? How could he, as the mediator, bear the concerns of the church and the world upon his shoulder? How could he judge the world? How could he bring all his sons and daughters to the possession of an eternal weight of glory? Take away the divinity of Jesus, and you take away the foundation-stone of the religion of the Bible, and with it the foundation of all your hopes. Reject the divinity of the Son of God, who condescended to become the son of man, the babe of Bethlehem, born in a stable and laid in a manger; and oh! what a dismal void then opens upon you! But let this Sun of Righteousness arise in his glorious perfections-let him shine forth upon

your souls in his transcendent glories; and then, as believers, your hearts will glow with his cheering rays, your eyes will meet with rapture the opening scenes of immortality, and your feet will press forward with vigour and delight toward the possession of your mansions in the heavens-the inheritance of the saints in light. God manifest in the flesh is the great mystery of godliness, which the angels desire and rejoice to look into.

A review of this subject might lead to many remarks for its improvement; but let it be concluded by considering the incarnation of Christ in three points of view :-as the ground of our deliverance, as the means of our holiness, and as the source of our joy.

1. The incarnation of the Saviour is the ground of our deliverance.

I mean here, deliverance from all our spiritual enemies; and this is the view in which it was contemplated by Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, who was the forerunner of the Redeemer ; when his tongue was loosed, he "was filled with the Holy Ghost, and prophesied, saying, Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and redeemed his people, and hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David; as he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began: that we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us. We are in the hands of enemies more cruel, tyrannous, and hateful, than were the Egyp

tabernacled among men, and manifested a "glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham. As the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same."

In proceeding to notice other circumstances respecting the incarnation of the Son of God, we come in the second place to consider,

II. The miraculous conception of Jesus Christ.

The providence of God had made great preparations for the coming of the Saviour; and the various predictions of the inspired writers had raised among the Jews a general expectation of a glorious deliverer, who was now about to appear. Those who studied the Holy Scriptures, could not but perceive that the period marked out by Jacob and Daniel, for the advent of Shiloh, Messiah, the Prince, must be near at hand. They were therefore looking for redemption in Israel; and those who did so, at length obtained the object of their hope. At the appointed season, in the fulness of time, the Saviour was announced. But who was the favoured instrument of bringing him into the world? It had been predicted that he was to be the son of David according to the flesh. He must therefore be born of some descendant of that illustrious king of Israel. It was however necessary that in his human nature he should be "holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners." In order therefore that the corruption of our fallen nature might not be communicated

to him, he must be conceived, and his body must be produced, in a different way from any other human being. It was accordingly provided in the divine councils and foretold by the prophet Isaiah, that 66 virgin should conceive and bear a son, and should call his name Emmanuel."

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A virgin of royal extraction, but fallen into low circumstances in life, a stranger in a strange place, betrothed to a carpenter named Joseph, is appointed to a higher honour than ever was conferred upon any other human being-to be the mother of the Redeemer of man. Thus God chooses the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty, and base things of the world and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: that no flesh should glory in his presence." But in connexion with this humiliation, the dignity and glory of the Saviour were also displayed. Gabriel, one of the highest order of angels, was commissioned by God to make the virgin acquainted with the divine counsels concerning her. Man, in his present state, cannot rise to the rank of angels; but they have been permitted, for wise and holy ends, to descend to the level of men. They have sometimes put on the human form, and adopted the language and accents of the human voice. In this instance, what a vast difference is there between the rank of the messenger, and that of the person to whom the