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The Purposes of the Incarnation.
“Rock of Ages, cleft for me, Let me hide myself in Thee.”
He was manifested, and by that manifestation I see wrought out the infinite truth of the passion of God which we speak of as the atonement. III. To Destroy the Works of the Devil. “To this end was the Son of God manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil” (I. John 3 :8). There can be no question as to the One to Whom John referred when he said, “the Son of God.” In all the writings of John it is evident that his eyes are fixed upon the man Jesus. Occasionally he does not even name Him; does not even refer to Him by a personal pronoun, but indicates Him by a word you can only use when you are looking at an object or a person. For instance, “That which we have seen with our eyes, that which we beheld, and our hands handled”. Upon another occasion he said, “He that saith he abideth in him, ought himself also to walk even as he walked.” It is always the method of expression of a man who is looking at a Person. For evermore the actual human Person of Christ was present to the mind of John as he wrote of Him. How intimate he had been with Him we all know. One of the most tender and beautiful things in all the story of the life of Jesus is the story of John’s pure human love for Him. The other disciples loved Him, but their love was of a different tone and quality from that of John. John must get close to Him, and lay his head upon His bosom. Yet if I said no more, I would not have uttered half the truth. I f John, the mystic, the lover, laid his head upon the human bosom of the Man of Nazareth, he heard the beating of the heart of God. If he laid his hand upon Jesus when he talked to Him, he knew that beneath the warm touch of the human flesh there beat the mystic majesty of Deity. “That which our hands handled, concerning the Word of life.” He is perfectly con-
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