upon them through their exalted Messiah0; and he tells them, that God had given this Messiah, not, as they imagined, to them only, but to the whole Gen- tile world; who would eventually run to him, and embrace him, and become the heirs of those bene- fits, which the ungrateful Israelites neglected and despised.
That it is the Messiah who is here spoken of, there can be no doubt. He is often designated by the name of David d: and " an unspeakable gift" he is to a ruined world6.
We propose to shew, I. For what ends he is given —
Doubtless he was sent for the salvation of man ; according as it written, " God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but should have everlasting life f." But there are two ends of his incarnation specified in the text ; to which therefore we will confine our attention. He was given,
1. " To be a Witness to the people"—
[God had from all eternity devised a plan for the redemp- tion of the world through the sufferings of his only-begotten Son. And of this plan the Lord Jesus Christ came to testify. For this office he was well qualified ; having concerted the plan together with his Father ; as it is written, " The counsel of peace was between them both5."
Of this stupendous mystery the Lord Jesus testified by the Prophets, hundreds of years before he came into the world. Not one word of all that they delivered on this momentous subject proceeded from themselves : " they spoke only as they were moved by the Holy Ghost11," and as they were instructed " by an immediate inspiration from God1." The Spirit by whose sacred agency they were moved, was " the Spirit of Christ:" as St. Peter says; " The Prophets, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto us, searched what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ did signify, when it tes- tified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow k." Here both the subject and the author of their
c Compare ver. 3. with Acts xiii. 34.
d Jer. xxx. 9. Ezek. xxxiv. 23, 24. Hos. iii. 5.
e 2 Cor. ix. 15. f John iii. 16. 8 Zech. vi. 13.
h 2 Pet. i. 21. « 2 Tim. iii. 10. k 1 Pet. i. 10,11.