him to continue there longer than he had originally expected), the time for Mary's delivery arrived, and, contrary to all human expectation, Jesus was born in the city which had been specified by the Prophet Micah seven hundred years before. Thus, whilst the decree of Caesar shewed that " the sceptre was now just departing from Judah," and, consequently, that the time for the advent of the heavenly " Shiloh was come," it unwittingly on his part caused the Messiah to be born in the very city which Micah had foretold.
The prophecy itself gives us such a glorious view of Christ, that we shall do well to enter more fully into it. It declares to us,
I. His advent in time —
Two things the prophet mentions respecting him ; 1 . The place of his birth —
[Bethlehem was of itself but a small city, and of little im- portance when compared with many other cities in the land of Judah; but it was the place of David's nativity11, and the place therefore which God ordained for the birth of David's Son, the Lord Jesus. The prophecy respecting it, we have before said, was generally known, especially among those who were at all conversant with the prophetic writings ; so that when Herod sent to the chief-priests and scribes to inquire where the Mes- siah was to be born, they all with one consent declared that Bethlehem was the destined place, and, in confirmation of their opinion, they cited this very passage which we are now considering b. And it is curious enough, that many years afterwards, when the enemies of Jesus insisted that, notwith- standing all his miracles, he could not possibly be the Messiah, they adduced this very passage0; winch, if their premises had been correct, would have fully supported their conclusion : they hiew that Jesus had been brought up at Nazareth ; and they supposed he had been born there : and, if they had been right in this conjecture, he certainly could not be the Messiah ; since it was ordained of God, that the Messiah should be born at Bethlehem.
This will account for the remarkable care which God in his providence took, that the birth of Jesus at Bethlehem should be placed beyond a possibility of doubt. Perhaps no other event, scarcely excepting, either his death or resurrection, was
a 1 Sam. xvi. 1, 1 1—13. b Matt. ii. 3—6. c John vii. 41, 42.