For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.—Isaiah ix. 6, 7.

These words, like numerous other passages in the word of God, are far too sublime to be attached to a mere creature; at the same time, they certainly express ideas which cannot be attributed to Deity. "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given," is language improper to be applied to Godhead, while the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, are titles too Godlike to belong to humanity. In what light are we to view them, if not as descriptive of the person of the God-man, Christ Jesus? To whom but the Messiah, are we to apply this, and the many expressions of a similar kind, which we find so profusely scattered through the sacred volume? It is to the wonderful person of the Messiah, God united to the man Christ Jesus, that we direct our thoughts, as the glorious object presented to the faith of the patriarchs and ancient Israel of God. To him give all the prophets witness. All the types prefigure him. All the shadows are designed to represent him, the substance. He is exhibited to our view in a variety of characters, relations, and offices; and is not God and man, united in one complex person, clearly revealed in this prophecy? Let us apply it to Jesus:—Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. Behold him! a babe at Bethlehem, subject to all the wants, weakness and helplessness connected with a state of infancy and childhood; such was the holy child Jesus. Unto us a son is given, who is acknowledged to be of David's royal line; yet this son of humanity, is also declared to be the only begotten Son of God, a Son who is the brightness of his Father's glory, and the express image of his person. But this Son is not given as a Saviour to fallen angels, they are passed by, although possessed of faculties and powers, far superior to the sons of earth; "God so loved the world as to give his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life." Yes, Christ is the gift of God, and the richest, God could bestow; he parted with the choicest jewel in the treasury of heaven; and God has not such another son to give, even if the redemption of ten thousand worlds required it. How amazing the love that could prompt even God, to deliver up such a son; a son, in whom he declared himself always well pleased; a son whom all the angels of God are commanded to worship; yet he was given up to shame, reproach, and sufferings; yea, his Father became the chief executioner. "It pleased the Father to bruise him, and put him to shame." Well might the prophet exclaim, "Wonder O heaven and be astonished O earth!" Jesus declared that, as the son of man, all power in heaven and earth was given to him; and surely the government ought to be on his shoulders, for who so fit to manage all, as he who is the Wonderful Counsellor; he who, from all eternity, knew the plans and counsels of Jehovah, and with whom he concerted and contrived the creation and redemption of man; and was it not between the Father and this Son, that the council of peace was settled and established, and is it not "a covenant well ordered in all things[30] and sure," and does not that part of it published to us in the written word, proclaim it the work of a Wonderful Counsellor? He indeed is wonderful, both in his person and work: the wonders of his love are here past finding out; the wonders of his grace are now unsearchable, and it is reserved for an eternity to discover all the mysteries in the Wonderful Person of the God-man, Christ Jesus, which are here incomprehensible.

Are we not told that the child born, the son given, is the mighty God? which must surely mean, that the same divine essence dwells in the Father and the Son; that it is one true and essential Godhead, dwelling in the person of the Father, Son, and Spirit; not that they are three Gods, but three distinct persons, constituting one Godhead?—(Does not the body and spirit form one man?) Is not the Son declared equal to the Father as touching his Godhead? Are not their names more descriptive of the relations they sustain in the scheme of Redemption, than indicative of any superiority or inferiority in their essence, or Godhead? Is it not the second person in the glorious Trinity, who has taken the human nature into union with his divine person? And are not God and man united in the complex person of Jesus of Nazareth, Israel's long promised and expected Messiah? His humanity is fully proved by his birth, life, and death; and his Deity is fully attested in the strongest language, for to whom the names, titles, attributes, works and prerogatives of God are ascribed, and declared to belong, surely, He must be the true God; and we have only to search the record of truth, and we shall find ascribed to him, all the distinguishing names and titles of God, as:—

Jehovah, or the Lord,—Isaiah vi. 1. 9, 10. John xii. 37-41. Isaiah xlv. 24, 25. Rom. v. 18. 2 Cor. v. 21. Psalm lxxxiii. 18. Isaiah xlii. 8., xlv. 5, 6. Jeremiah xxiii. 6. 1 Cor. i. 30. Zech. xi. 12, 13. Math. xxvii. 9, 10.

The true God,—John i. 2., xvii. 3. 1 John v. 20, 21.

The Great and Mighty God,—Deut. x. 17. Jer. xxxii. 18, 19. Isaiah ix. 6. Titus ii. 13.

The only God,—Rom. xiv. 9, 10, 11, 12. Deut. iv. 35. 39. Isaiah xlv. 5. 15. 18. 21-25.

The only wise God,—Eph. iii. 25, 26, 27. Jude 24, 25. Rom. xvi. 27. 1 Tim i. 17.

God blessed for ever,—Rom. i. 25. 2 Cor. xi. 31. Rom. ix. 5.

King of Kings, and Lord of Lords,—1 Tim. vi. 14, 15, 16. Rev. xvii. 14., xix. 13. 16. Deut. x. 17.

The Lord of Hosts,—2 Sam. vi. 2., vii. 26. Psalm xxiv. 10. Isaiah i. 24., vi. 3., viii. 13, 14., xliv. 6. Hosea xii. 4, 5. Isaiah viii. 13, 14., xxviii. 16. Psalm cxviii. 22. Matt. xxi. 42. 44. Luke xx. 17, 18. 1 Peter ii. 6, 7, 8. Hosea xii. 4, 5. Isaiah liv. 5. Rom. ix. 33., x. 11.

The First and the Last,—Isaiah xli. 4., xliv. 6., xlviii. 11, 12. Rev. i. 8. 11. 17, 18., ii. 8.

All the attributes of God ascribed to Christ.

Omniscience,—1 Kings viii. 39. Isaiah xli. 21, 22, 23. Jer. xvii. 9, 10. Matt. xii. 25. John ii. 24, 25., xxi. 17. Rev. ii. 23.

Omnipresence,—Psalm xxiii. 4., cxxxix. 7-10. Isaiah xli. 10., xliii. 5. Jer. xxiii. 24. Matt. xviii. 20., xxviii. 20. Eph. i. 23.

Omnipotence,—Gen. xvii. 1., xxxv. 11., xlviii. 3. Phil. iii. 21. Rev. i. 8.

Eternity,—Psalm xlv. 6., xc. 2. Isaiah xliv. 6. Heb. i. 8., vii. 3. Rev. i. 18., ii. 8.

Immutability,—Mal. iii. 6. Heb. i. 12., xiii. 8., i. 8.

Divine works ascribed to Christ.

Creation of the world,—Gen. i. 1. Psalm cii. 25, 26, 27. Isaiah xliv. 24. John i. 1, 2, 3. 10. Col. i. 16, 17. Heb. i. 3. 10., iii. 4.

Final Judgment of the world,—Psalm 1. 6. Matt. xxv. 31-46. John v. 21, 22. 25. 27. Rom. iii. 6., xiv. 10. 2 Tim. iv. 1. 2 Cor. v. 10.

The Prerogatives of God ascribed to Christ.

To forgive sin,—Isaiah xliii. 25. Matt. ii. 5. 10. Acts vii. 59, 60. Col. iii. 13.

To Baptise with the Holy Ghost,—Joel ii. 28, 29. Neh. ix. 20. Zech. xii. 10. Matt. iii. 11. Acts i. 5., ii. 33. John vii. 39., xvi. 7. Eph. iv. 8.

The Kingdom and Honours of God ascribed to Christ.

An everlasting Kingdom—Psalm xxix. 10., xlv. 6, 7. Heb. i. 8.

An universal Kingdom,—Psalm ciii. 19. John xvii. 10. Acts x. 36. Rom. x. 12.

Divine Worship,—Deut. vi. 13, 14, 15., x. 20. Exod. xxxiv. 14. Psalm xlv. 11. Matt. iv. 10. John v. 23., xiv. 1., xx. 28. Acts vii. 59. Rom x. 13., xiv. 11., xv. 12. Rev. v. 13.

Is not God represented in his word, as highly jealous of his honour, and has he not solemnly declared, that he will not give his glory to another? Then, if Christ is not equal to the Lord of Hosts, whence is it, that the great God does allow, and sanction, his distinguishing names, titles, attributes and works, to be ascribed to Jesus? Can we imagine God to be unmindful of his own honour, or so unkind to his creatures, as to permit those names so descriptive of Deity, to be applied to any mere creature, however superior, or exalted? Has he not pronounced an awful curse on those who worship any but the true God? Can we suppose the blessed God so inattentive to the happiness of his creatures, as to suffer in his revealed word, language so strikingly calculated to lead men into a belief of the Deity of Jesus, if in fact he was not God? No, the God of Truth does not trifle thus with the children of men. He has set all the great and fundamental doctrines of the gospel in the fore-ground; all truths that are essential to be known in order to salvation, are written as with a sunbeam; the Deity of Jesus, foremost of the whole, is so plain, "that he who runs may read," and the "wayfaring man, though a fool, cannot err therein." It does not require superior intellectual powers or attainments, to learn that Jesus is the Christ of God; but it does require art and skill in criticism, to give any other sense to the word of God. There are persons, who deny the Godhead of Jesus, and yet acknowledge him a being of exalted virtue, and a model of perfection, worthy of imitation. But do they not, in robbing him of Deity, destroy all his claim to our attention? in fact do they not make him an impostor and deceiver? Do they not, with the Jews, raise the cry of blasphemy against him? and bring him under the curse and punishment pronounced by the eternal and unchangeable Jehovah, against every blasphemer? Do we not hear Jesus saying—I and my Father are one, the Father dwelleth in me, and I in him, he that hath seen me, hath seen the Father also? And did he not demand all men, to honour the Son, even as they honour the Father? Did he not declare himself equal to the Father, and did not the Jews so understand him, when they took up stones to stone him, because he being man, made himself equal with God? Yes, Jesus proclaimed his Godhead; he allowed and encouraged religious worship to be paid him; in truth, he claimed all the belief and honours due to Deity. Surely then, if he is not God, he has forfeited all claim to our regard and veneration, and appears as a false prophet and teacher; but the mind shudders at imputing deception there. Blessed Jesus! may I, with Thomas, acknowledge thee, from a full conviction of thy Divinity, to be my Lord and my God. Thou hast declared thyself to be the Son of God with power, by thy resurrection from the dead. Hail! thou Wonderful Counsellor, thou Mighty God, thou Everlasting Father; thou who didst from eternity engage to be the Father and head of thy Church; thou who art the second Adam, the Lord from heaven; thou who watchest over thy Church with more than fatherly care; who suppliest all their wants, healest all their diseases, and who, in love, dost "chasten every son whom thou receivest," and wilt at the last great day, present thyself with them to the Father, saying, "Behold I and the children whom thou hast given me." Yes, thou art the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace; and who so calculated to make peace between God and man, as he in whose person they are both united? He has peace to make between heaven and earth. He can know and satisfy the honour of God, for he is God; he can feel the wants and sorrows of man, for he is "bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh." When he entered our world, was there not a proclamation of peace on earth, and good will to man? Yes, for the Prince of Peace was come, to make peace and reconciliation, by the blood of his cross. He is a successful Peace-maker; he is, in fact, the only Mediator between God and man; nor is he yet weary of his office, but ever liveth to make intercession for us. Hail! thou Prince of Peace. Did not this glorious Mediator love to manifest himself in that character to the Church, from the earliest ages of the world? Did he not honour many of the patriarchs and prophets with a display of his person? Was it not the Messiah, who appeared to the Old Testament saints? Has he not ever been the only visible image of the invisible God? Are we not told that no man hath seen the Father, save the only begotten of the Father, who came down from heaven? Do we not find an opinion generally prevalent amongst the ancient Jews, that no man could see the face of God, and live? Moses, and the assembled multitude at mount Sinai, were of this opinion. Isaiah exclaimed, "Wo is me, I am undone, for I have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." Manoah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Amos, and the other ancient worthies to whom God appeared, were filled with the same awful apprehensions. Is it not more than probable, that God, in the person of the Father, has ever been invisible to the inhabitants of earth? Would not the true majesty, and splendour of Godhead be more than man in his present state could bear? Might not the sight of unclouded Deity destroy a body of flesh? Are not all those passages where the great God is said to appear and converse with his creatures, more applicable to the God-man, Christ Jesus, than to the first person of the sacred Trinity? Is it not more becoming him, who, in after ages, was to take on him a body of flesh and blood, to appear as man, than that God the Father, should do so? Were not the three men who appeared to Abraham in the plains of Mamre, as he sat at his tent door, in the heat of the day, this Messiah God-man, attended by two angels; and were not the two angels sent forward to destroy Sodom, while the Lord tarried behind to hear the intercession of Abraham, for that devoted city? Was not the same glorious personage the man with whom Jacob wrestled, when he is said to have had power with God and to have prevailed? Was he not that Angel of God's presence, who led the children of Israel into Canaan, of whom God said, "beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not, for he will not pardon your transgressions; for my name is in him?" Did he not also appear to Joshua, as Captain of the Lord's hosts? Did he not in vision appear in the same form to Ezekiel and Daniel, as he afterwards did to John, in the Isle of Patmos? And are not all the other passages, of a similar kind, equally applicable to the Christ of God? Can we not enter into the prophet's meaning, and set our seal to the glorious truth, that "unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace?"