Saviour; as one who has not spared His Son for me; as one who, when Christ was dead as having taken our sins, raised Him from the dead. In a word, I not only believe in Christ but in Him who has given Christ and owned His work; who has given glory to man in Him; as a God who has come to save, not as one who is waiting to judge me. I believe in Him by Christ. When Israel had passed the Red Sea they believed in a God who had delivered them and brought them to Himself; and so do I. I know no other God but that. If I believe in Him by Christ I do wait for a promise, for the redemption of the body, for the full results of His work. Thus Christianity gives us present affections, in peace, in a known relationship, and the energising power of hope; the two things that give blessing and energy to man as to his position; for love is the spring of all. Love, because He first loved us; and finding our joy in Him, love to others, as partaking of His nature, and Christ's dwelling in our hearts, so that love constrains

us.

You make a Christian a wonderful person in the world; but we are very weak for such a place.

I could never make him in my words what God has made him in His. As to weakness the more we feel it the better. Christ's strength is made perfect in our weakness.

B. M.

No. IX.

IMMANUEL, HIS RULE AND HIS SERVICE.

ISAIAH i.-xiv.

STANDING on the top of Pisgah, in the field of Zophim, Balaam, gifted with the spirit of prophecy, peered through the long vista of ages not yet ended, and announced to Balak, awaiting the prophet's curse on Israel, that God had blessed them and he could not reverse it. Hopeless was it to expect he could prevail by any incantation against this people; for "the Lord

his God" is with him, and the shout of a king is among them. "Surely," he adds, "there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel; according to (or at) this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, What hath God wrought ?" (Numb. xxiii. 20-23.) Years, centuries pass away, when another prophet appears, not to use enchantments against Israel, for he warns them against resorting to such iniquitous practices (Isa. viii. 19), but to announce in language clear, forcible, and beautiful, that what Balaam had predicted would surely come to pass, God would work for the deliverance of His people, but in a way which should astonish all. So he traces out the path of the Lord Jesus from His birth to His kingdom, as is attempted to be pointed out in the following pages. God had brought Israel out of Egypt and into Canaan; had given to David, and Solomon after him, the land promised to Abraham and his descendants, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates. He had shown their fathers in the days of Joshua what it was to have the captain of the Lord's host in their midst, He had proved many times how, when minished and brought low by the incursions of enemies from without, or the uprisings of enemies within the land, He could raise up deliverers to set them free. But as yet the perfect deliverance which He would effect, so that men might say "What hath God wrought," had not been manifested. It is of this Isaiah sings at an eventful period of the history of the kingdom of Judah. Commencing with the year that King Uzziah died, the first prophecy in the book with a date prefixed, and going on to the time when the King of Babylon sent messengers to King Hezekiah after he was recovered of his sickness, the last date given in the book, we get unfolded the condition of the people in the latter days, and the appearance and work of the One by whom their deliverance will be effected.

Some of those by whom the Lord had wrought for His people to rescue them from their enemies were called from a humble sphere. Gideon, the least in his father's house, of a poor family of the tribe of Manasseh,

was called from the threshing-floor to subdue the Midianites," so that they lifted up their heads no more (Judges viii. 28). Jephthah, the outcast and exile from his family, was recalled from the land of Tob to confront the armies of the Ammonites, whom he smote, "from Aroer, even till thou come to Minnith, even twenty cities, and unto the plain of the vineyards with a very great slaughter. Thus the children of Ammon were subdued before the children of Israel" (Judges xi. 33). David was taken from the sheepfold to do battle with Goliath of Gath. So He by whom God's people shall be finally set free was once in this world in lowliness the reputed son of a carpenter. But how great is the difference in this between Gideon, Jephthah, David, and the Lord! They were of low estate, and God exalted them. He had to humble Himself, for He is God over all. Accordingly we have in this prophet the Lord presented as God and as man, filling various offices, and appearing in different characters." He is the mighty God, yet a helpless infant; King, yet servant; overcomer, yet overcome; intercessor and avenger; the Holy One of Israel, yet the bearer of His people's iniquities.

the

Beginning with the moral condition of the people, with which both heaven and earth are made acquainted, the prophet speedily passes on to the day of the Lord, commencement of the millennium, when the nation of Israel should enter on the enjoyment of permanent blessing on earth. Much, however, had to take place before that era could dawn on the people of God. Unfitted by their moral condition for God's presence, judgment must do its work. So the vision of chap. vi. is recorded. Its date is significant, the close of Uzziah's life. During his reign prosperity attended Judah; for he warred against the Philistines, and brake down the wall of Gath, and the wall of Jabneh, and the wall of Ashdod, and built cities about Ashdod, and among the Philistines. And God helped him against the Philistines, and against the Arabians that dwelt in Gur-Baal, and the Mehunims. And the Ammonites gave gifts to Uzziah and his name spread abroad even to the entering in of Egypt. for he was marvellously helped till he was strong" (2 Chron. xxvi. 6-15). This

prosperity continued under his son Jotham, who fought with the king of the Ammonites, and prevailed against them" (2 Chrom. xxvii. 5, 6). But though outwardly prosperous Judah was not obedient to God, and no more morally fit for the presence of God in their midst than Israel, whose condition at this time was one of anarchy, confusion, and lawlessness; for during the fifty-two years of Uzziah's reign he had seen six different monarchs in Israel, three of whom were murdered. At this juncture it was then that Isaiah received his commission from Jehovah, seated on a throne, to announce judgment on the whole nation. Yet a remnant should be preserved. He saw Jehovah of hosts, but John xii. tells us it was the Lord Jesus Christ who then gave judgment against His people, a judgment the righteousness of which none could question after the glory of the only begotten of the Father had been displayed, and His own had refused to receive Him (John xii. 37–41; Acts xxviii. 25-27). But this judgment is not final. It carries on "until," etc. (see ver. 11-13).

Since Israel became a nation, God has raised up instruments to deliver His people, or lead them to victory. Moses, Joshua, the Judges, David, are instances of this. In the days yet to dawn on that afflicted nation we learn He will act in a similar manner. But," by whom," one may ask in the words of Amos, shall Jacob arise? for he is small" (Amos vii. 2). We get the answer in our prophet, chap. vii.-xii., accompanied with an account of the inroad and success of the Assyrian of the prophet's day, typical of the king of the north in a future day. The virgin's son, Immanuel, is the man of God's choice, and the time selected for the prophetic announcement of the manner of His birth was during the reign of Ahaz, when Judah had been brought low, and Ahaz was dispirited, threatened with a confederacy, organised against him and his kingdom, of Israel and Syria. “Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call His name Immanuel." To Him the land shall belong. The Assyrian might invade Judah, and overspread the country, as he did subsequently in the reign of Hezekiah; he might reach to the neck, but should never overwhelm it. The stretching out of his

wings might fill the breadth of the land, but there he must stop; for the land belongs to Immanuel, which is 'God with us.' The waters may burst. their banks, but they cannot rise beyond the permitted level, for no counsel, no might can withstand God. This prophecy, partially fulfilled in the reign of Hezekiah, awaits its complete accomplishment in the latter day (see x. 12, 24, 25). The land being Immanuel's (viii. 8), the people need not fear the threatened attack, nor need the faithful join with the others in desiring a confederacy to ward off the impending calamity; for Immanuel (as we learn from Heb. ii. 13) speaks words of encouragement; "I will wait upon the Lord that hideth His face from the house of Israel, and I will look for Him ;" and the remnant, who obey God's voice, He owns as children. given Him for signs and wonders in Israel from the "Lord of hosts which dwelleth in Mount Zion." Nor can the faithful be disappointed. For He, who owns. them as the children given Him, owns the land, and will sit on David's throne. The great ones of the earth have titles and dignities suited to their high positions. He likewise has His Immanuel speaks of God's presence with His people. His names in ix. 6 show how fitted is this child to get the victory, and to fill that throne vacant for ages, but just previous to all this seized on by the usurper Antichrist. "His name shall be called Wonder ful, Counsellor, the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace." A new era must then dawn on this world, for the stability and duration of His rule is next declared. "Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to esta blish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this."

In chapter xi. we get something more about the kingdom, viz., that which characterises His rule. His title is indisputable, for He is the rod out of the stem of Jesse, a branch that grows out of his roots. His perfect fitness for the duties which, as King, He must perform is secured, for the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon.