I. His representation of the Deity —
In the Old Testament, Jehovah was known as *' the God of Abraham ;" but in the New Testament, he is exhibited mider a yet more endearing character, as " the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort." Observe here,
1. His relation to Christ —
[There is in the Godhead a distinction between the Three Persons of the ever-blessed Trinity; the first Person is called the Father ; the second Person, the Son ; and the third Person is called the Holy Ghost. The Son is said to be " the only- begotten of the Father:" but of this inscrutable mystery it were in vain to speak, since we should only " darken counsel by words without knowledge." It is sufficient for us to know, that such a distinction in the Godhead does exist, and that, in this sense, God was, from all eternity, " the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ."
Of the manhood of Christ, formed as it was by Omnipotence without the intervention of man, God may in a more definite sense be said to have been the Father: and in reference to this, his miraculous conception in a virgin's womb, Jesus was especially designated " the Son of God''."
In his mediatorial capacity also, as " Emmanuel, God with us," our Lord Jesus Christ stands in covenant relation to God, as a Son to a Father ; agreeably to what he himself says, " I ascend unto ray Father and your Father, to my God and your God^"
Now, as all the children of Israel claimed a special interest in Jehovah as being the seed of Abraham whose God he was, so we, who look to Jesus as our common Head and Saviour, are entitled to consider his God as oii7- God, since we are in him as members of his mystical body, and are altogether " one spirit with him." And, as Jesus is infinitely greater in himself, and more dear to God, than ever Abraham was, our interest in God, by virtue of our union with Jesus, is pi-oportionably greater and more endeared.]
2. His relation to us —
[To us, who are involved in the deepest guilt and misery, he is revealed as " the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort." What remarkable expressions are these ! There is not a mercy which we enjoy, but it must be traced to him as its proper source; nor is there a mercy which we want, but it
'' Luke i. 35. « John xx. 17. Acts xiii. 33.