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I have sent also unto you, saith God, not merely my servants the prophets, but my only-begotten, Jesus Christ your Lord, saying, 'Return you now every man from his evil way, and amend your doings, and go not after other gods to serve them, and ye shall dwell in the land which I have given to you and to your fathers. But ye have not inclined your ear, nor hearkened unto me.
Again therefore Barlaam took up his parable and said, "If thou wilt learn who is my Master, it is Jesus Christ the Lord, the only-begotten Son of God, 'the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings, and Lords of lords; who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto'; who with the Father and the Holy Ghost is glorified.
How could he dream that the Lord God would condescend to be made flesh, and dwell among us, and show man His glory, the glory of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth how could he dream that?
Popular theology has it that Jesus, the only-begotten eternal Son of God, took human flesh and a human nature, was conceived by the Holy Ghost in the womb of a virgin, and was born into the world in a wholly miraculous way a way which stamps Him as different from all that were ever born of woman before or since.
In these words of the Hebrew singer there sound the first faint tones of a music that was to swell into clear notes, when Jesus said: 'If a man love Me, he will keep My Word, and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him. They who are knit by faith and love to God's only-begotten and beloved Son, by that union receive 'power to become the sons of God, and share in the love which is ever pouring out from the Father's heart on 'the Son of His love.
We ought, then, to abide in the knowledge of the goodness of God in Himself, perceiving that He has created us in His image and likeness, and re-created us in grace by the Blood of His only-begotten Son, the sweet incarnate Lord; and reflecting how continually the goodness of God works in us.
Here I differ 'toto orbe' from Waterland, and say with Luther and Zinzendorf, that before the Baptism of John the 'Logos' alone had been distinctly revealed, and that first in Christ he declared himself a Son, namely, the co-eternal only-begotten Son, and thus revealed the Father.
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." The Fourth Gospel once, and once only, identifies this Word with the pre-existent nature of Jesus, in the concluding words of the same exordium: "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we behold His Glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."
When we understand this to be the will of the Father in Christ, then shall we know God to be merciful, and not angry. We shall realize that He loved us wretched sinners so much indeed that He gave us His only-begotten Son into death for us. The pronoun "our" refers to both God and Father. He is our God and our Father. Christ's Father and our Father are one and the same.
But if He is, as we believe, the only-begotten and well-beloved Son of God, let us yield to His claims upon us; let us rest on His all-atoning work, and go forth to serve Him all the days of our life. "God commandeth all men everywhere to repent." Acts xvii. 30. Repentance is one of the fundamental doctrines of the Bible.
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