OFFICES OF THE HOLY TRINITY IN THE WORK OF REDEMPTION.
Isai. xlviii. 16. Now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me.
SO mysterious and important a doctrine as that of a Trinity of Persons in the Godhead ought not to be founded on any grounds which are not clear, strong, adequate, convincing. But it may be illustrated from passages on which we could not altogether venture to establish it. Such is the passage which I have now brought before you. It might well be supposed, that so important a doctrine as this should pervade the Holy Scriptures, just in the way that all the fun- damental doctrines of our religion do; and that there should be intimations of it in many places, where the express mention of it would not be expected to occur.
And this we find throughout the whole Scriptures, as I shall presently take occasion to shew. In the whole chapter which precedes this, from whence my text is taken, God is declaring that he will destroy Babylon, and bring out from thence his captive people, and restore them to their own land : and, throughout the chapter which is before us, he warns his people to bear in remembrance, that he had foretold this event several hundred years before it should be accom- plished; and that, consequently, when it should occur, they must trace it, not, as they would be ready to do, to their idols, but to Jehovah himself, who had fore- ordained it for the glory of his own name, and who had designed it to be a type of a yet greater deli- verance, which he would in due season effect for a ruined world. It is in this connexion that the speaker says, " Now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me ;" that is, hath commissioned me to announce to you these great events.
But it is a matter of doubt, who the speaker is. If it be the prophet, then the sense of the passage is clear : but if it be the same divine Person as is speak- ing throughout the whole context, namely, the Son of God, the Saviour of Israel, the Messiah, then a small alteration must be made in our translation ; and the passage must be read, " Now the Lord God hath sent me, and his Spirit;" that is, hath sent me to effect this great deliverance, and his Spirit to reveal it to you; and both myself and the Holy Spirit, to accom- plish that infinitely greater deliverance that is prefi- gured by it. This is the sense which the most approved expositors adopt, and which therefore I also shall follow : though, as far as respects the use which I shall make of the passage, it is of no moment which construction we prefer ; since, in either case, a plurality of persons in the Godhead is clearly intimated. I propose, then, to consider,
I. The distinction of Persons in the Godhead —
I have already observed, that we might reasonably expect the doctrine of the Trinity, if it be indeed true,