II. But we get a still clearer insight into this relation when we turn to the incarnation, and the redemption of man. As soon as we come to consider the economy of grace and salvation, although the fact of sin and alienation from God is painfully evident, we find expressed, both in the Old and New Testament, a depth and tenderness of love, a yearning of God after the heart of man which sets the relation between the two in a very striking light. We have first the promise, then the covenant, after that the law and the prophets, each of them bringing to view in clearer light successively the relation between God and man, until, in the fullness of time, the two are made one and life and immortality are brought to light by Jesus Christ through the gospel. (2 Tim. 1: 10.) Here atonement is made for sin, the middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile is broken down, the love of God has free course, and we all are children of one common Father. We are children of God, however, not simply because we are bought to be His, redeemed by Christ Jesus, however precious is the truth that "He hath purchased the Church with His own blood." (Acts 20: 28.) Nor yet are we children because we have imputed to us His righteousness or are made pure and holy by faith in Jesus Christ. We are children, sons, of God, because in Christ we "become partakers of the divine nature" (1 Pet. 1: 4), and in the regeneration come to be of the same kin or kindred with Him.

While, therefore, we recognize the great truth that the Lord. Jesus Christ," when the fullness of time was come, came down from heaven, and became man, for us men and for our salvation," we regard the incarnation not simply as a means or contrivance by which the Son of God could die for the sins of the world. It is rather the fulfillment of the promise lodged in the very constitution of man, the coming down of God to meet the upward movement of nature in man, a movement which rests in and is carried forward by God's eternal counsel and working, that His image in man should be perfectly realized. The incarnation is not an afterthought. It is not a turning back to

begin anew a movement which had failed in the be it is a real advance on the original condition of m tion of the idea of man in the ideal man by a p between God and man. This, as a matter of cours re-heading of the race, a second Adam, a new cre at once the lifting up of humanity into a new re involves all the sons of the first Adam, and also spiritual energy or power by which men are born an kingdom of heaven and made members of Ch was not possible at first nor immediately after the f came possible only after a process of moral and religio ment. God could not become incarnate in an ox or ibis. He could not abstractly or suddenly descend fr to take up his abode in man. There is a vast differen the supposed aratar of the pagan systems, and the i of the gospel. The one is incongruous, absurd and i the other is normal, rational and necessary. Given in the image and likeness of God, and union between man must follow in the normal development of man's religious nature. Given fallen man, and the whole the race through the Old Testament dispensation, li wandering through the wilderness into the Promised necessarily required to produce as its flower and fruit Mary before the Only-begotten of the Father can taber human flesh.

Rev. J. R. Illingworth in "The Incarnation and I ment," Lux Mundi, p. 153–4, speaking of the develop doctrine by the great thinkers of the early Church, says identity of Him who was made man and dwelt among 1 Him by whom all things were made and by whom all consist; His eternal pre-existence as the reason and the of God, the Logos; His indwelling presence in the univ the source and condition of all its life, and in man as the of his intellectual being; His resurrection, His ascension these thoughts were woven into one magnificent picture, w creation was viewed as the embodiment of the Divine ideal

therefore the revelation of the Divine character; manifesting its Maker with increasing clearness at each successive stage in the great scale of being, till in the fullness of time He Himself became man, and thereby lifted human nature, and with it the material universe to which man is so intimately linked; and triumphing over the sin and death under which creation groaned and travailed, opened by His resurrection and then by His ascension vistas of the glorious destiny prepared for His creatures before the world was. Factus est quod sumus nos, uti nos perficeret esse quod est ipse.' (IREN ÆUS.)"

Rev. Dr. R. W. Dale of Birmingham, Eng., at the recent International Congregational Council, in London, speaking of "the Divine Life in Man," said: "I have said that this life, according to the Divine will and purpose, has been made the inheritance of the race. As the incarnation is no afterthought of the Divine mind occasioned by the entrance of sin into the world, neither is the gift of eternal life in Christ a mere expedient for recovering men from the power of sin. That man should live his life in the power of the life of the eternal Son was included in the Divine idea of man. This was the perfection to which according to the original constitution of our nature we were destined. Through sin we have all fallen short of the glory of God, missed, forfeited the transcendent honor, righteousness and blessedness for which we were created; but it remains true that we were created in Christ Jesus, and through the infinite grace of God and the power of Christian redemption all that was possible to us through our creation may yet be recovered."

III. Although the incarnation is the realization of the ideal man in the organic union of God and man, it is not yet the end of the process by which man attains to his complete and perfect dignity and glory. As in the life of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ there was a progressive manifestation of the power and glory of the Godhead as His humanity itself developed, which became complete in His resurrection and glorification, so in man, too, there is a process of growth which only finds its

completion beyond the grave. There is another s of development, the gliniteation of man, which order to the fall fraction of human life in its relati fountain or source. This part of the subject d.Era't, because it lies beyond the boundary o knowledge and experience, and we have only g King's Country and its inhabitants as from a fa hear faint n'tes of the music of that realm as the the waters and full upon our enraptured ears. some in lications of the magnitude and the signif change which, by the working of the grace of Go place in us and in the whole Cosmos, when God in all.

First of all we have the example of our Lord and then the inspired teachings of the apostles and lypse. With the time at our disposal we can on few points bearing on this aspect of our subject.

These

In the incarnation, we have said, the human b organ or medium through which the divine finds ex manifestation, and at every stage of development manifestation is commensurate with the human cap ceive and express the glory of the divine. tended for each other, and what normal humanity is is manifest in the transfiguration, where the Lord a the eyes of the disciples all glorious and bright, før power of human tongue to portray, or the heart of present condition to conceive. Again we see what c Lord's body had undergone in the resurrection, and the glorification He appeared to St. Paul. Does not a dicate that through the glorification, the human bed full and adequate medium through which the div expression? If now, we take the words of St. John quoted: "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and yet made manifest what we shall be. We know that if be manifested, we shall be like him, for we shall see h as he is," what a flood of light they shed upon our futur

tion, and the relation of man to God when the goal of human aspiration shall have been reached!

This condition involves, first, what we usually express by the term rest. But it is more than the mere negative conception ;* While sin is eliminated and the antagonisms of the present life are removed, all imperfection of striving and attainment is done away with, and all the powers of man are exerted in full, free, and harmonious activity. Secondly, all the powers of our human nature are heightened and perfected, so that man attains to the full dignity of the knowledge, power, and glory of which his nature is capable. Thirdly, all this is but in order to the perfected idea of society which involves perfect communion and fellowship between God and man, and between man and man as all bound together in a common brotherhood, because all are sons of a common Father.

It would seem to follow then, as the result of our inquiry, that the relation of humanity to divinity rests upon the fact that man is made in the image and likeness of God, and that this relation finds its full expression and realization in the idea of sonship. From all eternity, the Son, generated in the bosom of the Father, is the type of our nature which is to be realized in time by a process which begins with the natural creation, ripens into the incarnation, and comes to its full development and completion in the glorification of humanity when time shall be no more. From this point of view we may say that we have the true type of all fatherhood in God. But sonship, we think, cannot be properly predicated of man except in Christ. It is only when we look to the economy of salvation which has for its center always the incarnation, the revelation of God in human flesh, involving the atonement for sin through the cross of Christ, and the gift of a new life through His resurrection and glorification, that we realize the fatherhood of God, being adopted as sons through Christ Jesus, the only begotten Son. (Eph. 1: 5; John i. 12. Gal. 3: 26). This is the doctrine of the Heidelberg Catechism, and we believe that it is the doctrine of the Holy Scriptures.

* Martensen, Dogmatics, 290.