little one way or another? But behold what takes place when you deny the Trinity. You deny and must cut out of the Bible this tremendous Scripture. This very Scripture: “ He through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God” (Heb. 9:14). It is, indeed, an immense Scripture. It means the whole Godhead was en gaged in the sacrifice of the cross. The whole Godhead in the fulness of personality was engaged in the act of redemption. The Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, each of them an infinite Person subsisting in the indivisible Be ing of God. The Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of the Father offered Himself unto God as the Father. He offered Himself through the Eter nal, personal Spirit. As an infinite Person, He offered Him self through the infinite personality of the Spirit to the infinite personality of God the Father; even the God and Father who through the Spirit gave Him out of His very bosom that He might make this offering. Deny the Trinity of God, you deny and make impossible that Scripture. Deny and reject that Scripture, you deny and reject the sacrificial death of Christ; you deny it in relation to the everlasting covenant and the pledge and honor of tlie whole Godhead. When you do that you sweep away the foundation of Christianity as set forth in Holy Scripture from Genesis to Revelation. You deny that Scripture when you deny the Trinity. You deny the Trinity when you deny the virgin birth. To deny the virgin birth and talk about the ethical value of Christianity is worse than childish. There are no ethics left. Instead of ethics, the whole system is buried in a moral ruin, out of whose chaos there looks the face of a Christ, illegitimate, bastard-born, a helpless sin ner like the rest of us, and like the rest of us bereft of any hoped-for Saviour. For us there is only a Christianity whose beginning is a fiction and whose ending is the substitution of an ethical for a sacrificial Christ, a substitution that bears the stamp of its own treason, and in every promise it makes, mocks the hope of our soul both for time and eternity. Without the virgin birth Christianity has no authority, neither as an ethical nor doctrinal system. Without the vir gin birth, I repeat, Christianity has no decent, moral, spiritual nor intellectual basis on which to stand. He who denies the virgin birth de nies Bible Christianity, smites the moth er of our Lord with shame, snatches the crown of deity from His brow, strips Him of His sinless humanity, makes His cross a blood-stained failure and bids us face eternity with no light in the darkness. T H E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
What think you is the weight of these millstones about the neck of Him whom we seek to call the Son of God? Consider, 3. The effect the denial of the Virgin Birth must have upon the essential being of Jesus Himself. If He were not virgin born, then of course He had a human father. If He had a human father He in herited the nature of that father. As that father had a nature of sin He inherited his nature of sin. If He had a nature of sin He would be under the penalty of all who are born in sin. He would be under the penalty of death. When therefore He claimed that no one could take His life from Him, that He had power over His own life, He did not tell the truth; being born in sin (if He had a human father) He was as all others, doomed to die. He was therefore a lost sinner. As a lost sinner He needed a Saviour. He needed a Saviour to save Him from death. According to His own legislation He needed to be born again; He needed a new nature. It is terrific—but it is inexorable logic. If Jesus Christ were not virgin born; if He had a sinful human father, He was as much in need of regeneration and sacrificial redemption as any other be gotten of a human father. Deny the virgin birth and you para lyze the whole scheme of redemption by Jesus Christ. What claim or right of claim has any man to be the Redeemer and Saviour of men who Himself is born in sin, under the doom and penalty of sin, needing regeneration? But that is not the only consequence of having a human father. Mark it well. If He had a human father, and as that father had a finite personality, then He inherited a finite personality. If He had a finite personality, of course we are bound to say He did not have an infinite personality. He was not an infinite person. If He were not infinite He was not God. If He were not God, then He was not the Second Person of the Eternal Trin ity. If He were not the Second Person of the Trinity then none was. If none were, there is no triunity of God. If there be no triunity of Godhead we are landed at the front door of Unitarianism, that bloodless, emotion less, soulless system which substitutes intellect for Spirit, reason for faith and prating about God, knows Him not. Deny the virgin .birth, and as abso lutely as two and two make four, as inexorably as the arrow to the mark, you deny and reject the Trinity of God. Do you think it a light and inconse quential thing to deny the virgin birth or that it is something that matters
Consider, I pray you, 2. The effect this denial of the Virgin Birth must have upon the name and reputation of Jesus Himself. If some man other than Joseph were His father, and He were begotten and conceived out of wedlock, then He was an illegitimate child, a child who had no legal right to come into the world. This is what you must face—Jesus Christ an illegitimate son. But that is not all. Deny the virgin birth, make Mary a faithless wife, guilty of breaking wed lock, and you make her son something more than illegitimate. It is plain enough what that some thing more is. It is just this: If some other man than Joseph were the father of Jesus we have to reckon this—that man was not known. He was not known in that day. He has not been known any day since. He is not known now. No man can put his finger upon his identity and name and say this is the man who betrayed Joseph and begot Mary’s illegitimate son. There can be no question about it. He was and is unknown. It follows therefore if Jesus had an earthly father and that father was not known, we have to say that Jesus was the son of an unknown father. And what is the name in all lan guages you give to the son of an un known father? There is but one name and title. And that is, A bastard. It is an ugly name. It looks ugly. It sounds ugly. A bastard. Would you know what God thinks of a bastard? Hear what He says: “ A bastard shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord: even to his tenth generation shall he not enter into the congregation of the Lord” (Deut. 23:2). A bastard could not enter into the congregation of the Lord. The posterity of a bastard could not enter into nor partake of the privileges of the congregation of the Lord for ten generations; that is to say, for three hundred years. This tells you what God thinks of an unmarried woman who gives birth to a child. This tells you what God thinks of a married woman who gives birth to a child by another than her own husband. This tells you what God thinks of the bastard himself. Bastardy is a shame to the mother. Bastardy is a double shame to the son. He must carry his mother’s shame and advertise it wherever he goes, and he must bear his own shame as a bastard, ashamed of God. Illegitimacy and bastardy are two millstones heavy enough to hang about the neck of any son. Page Eight
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