Isaiah 9:6-7 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given: and the government shall be on his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful… This promise of a Deliverer has lit up the march of all human generations; it has been the fountain of the fairest gleams which have crossed the darkness of the heathen world. And it is out of the bosom of Humanity that the Redeemer must be born — the Christ must be the human Child. The essential point lies here — redemption is not a process wrought by the right hand of power, so to speak, from without; the act of a Being of almighty power, who, seeing man in desperate extremity through sin and frustrating utterly the purposes and preparations of Heaven, stooped to lay hold on him, to lift him out of the abyss in which he was sinking, sad to place him by a sovereign act on a foundation where he might rest in safety, and work and grow. It is from within the bosom of humanity that the redemption is to be wrought which is to save humanity. It is by the outward sad upward pressure of a life which is truly and fully human, which has buried its Divine force in the very heart's core of our nature, and is "bone of our bones, and flesh of our flesh," that man is to be lifted to the levels which are above the sphere of tears and death forever. (J. B. Brown, B. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counseller, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. |
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