The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1906-12-20
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A SERMON X<fSE&&
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CHRISTMAS DISCOURSE.
Theme: The Significance of the Birth
of Christ.
CHRISTMAS DISCOURSE.

Wemmell Henderson. pastor. took as
his text Luke 2:11: For unto you
is born this day. in the city of David,
a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord"
He said:
The coming of the Christ is the
axis of Western chronology and the
inspiration OF uncounted souls.
When. on that starry night amid the
fertile fields of Judea the angel of
the Lord stood beside the watching
shepherds aud the multitude of the
heavenly host sang hosanna to the
living God. the sweetest, most en-
trancing soul among the sons of men
began His earthly history The wise
men from afar, who laid at the feet
of the manger babe the royal costly
gifts, we're but the precursors of
glad, rejoicing host who. in every
epoch and every cline. have rendered
homage to the Christ. The sudden
light that bathed the quiet plain that
peaceful Christmas eve beams to-day
with undimmed radiance into multi
tudes of hearts. The voices that sang
from heaVen to earth still sing to
listening ears. The angel of the Lord
still speaks. The babe whom Mary
loved is with us. The Son of God is
here,
The birth of Christ is historic The
presence of Christ yesterday and to-
day is a fact. Nothing is more cer-
tain than that Christ once lived. The
Gospels attest it. Contemporaneous
records recognize 1t. The Christian
world around us is a consequential
evidence of His reality and His in
fuence. Men may dispute concern
ing the exact day and month and
year of His coming into the affairs
of men; they may speculate concern
ing the exact place OF His birth; they
may argue, as they will, over the
manner of His coming; but they can
not, they have not and they will not
deny His actuality. Jesus is fact;
the most momentous fact of history
Let us consider the Significance of
the birth of Jesus in the light of the
ages.
The birth of Jesus is significant as
we consider 1t to be the fulfillment
of Hebrew prophecy; as we under
stand II to be the elimination of
divine self revelation; as we study its
effect on humanity.
The birth of Jesus was the fulfill
ment of prophecy Except we glance
down the long record of the prophetic
hopes of Israel we cannot understand
the Christ Christ, apart from jew
ish history, is inexplicable. Jesus is
not an isolated, but, rather. a result
ant fact. The Saviour is the fulfill
ment of a nations hope, though so
largely unaccepted He is the con-
summation of the efforts of a ma
tion's sanity men to lead their peo-
pie near to God. The messages of
Isaiah are the adumbrations of the
Christ. The visions of the prophets
are the fore-gleams of the gentle
Galilean. Israel looked with expect
ancy and with hope unquenchable
for Immanuel-the presence of Je-
hovah in the midst of His people
Having been led out OF physical and
carking bondage they looked forward
with eagerness at a later day TO a
Jesus, a Saviour, who, clothed with
divine power and enriched with di-
vine commission, should lead the sin
sick people of God out of the thrall-
dom of spiritual slavery into the free
dom and the blessedness of an eternal
land sufficient salvation from their
sins. Jesus was the fulfillment of that
hope and prophecy. What the faith
'ers had declared, He was. The chos-
EN- people of God yearned for an
earthly king, a Messiah anointed of
God, set apart to holy leadership.
divinely dedicated to the consumma-
tion of a national existence in right
eousness and truth. And in Jesus
was this other hope fulfilled, and
with a nobler purpose and with
larger scope. Within the spiritual
kingdom that He came to institute
lay the secret of a kingdom which
Ehnn1A rtala tha Jnr
than any prophecy and hope of Is
rael was the plan that, in Jesus
Christ, God unfolded to His chosen
people. What pity it is that nine
teen centuries ago Israel did not see
the beauty Of the plan OF God, that
she did not recognize that broader
and that gTander mission OF world
wide ministration and universal do
minion TO which God, in Jesus. called
her And how sad it is to-day that
tho race 10 whom the principles OF
Jesus ere most easily understandable
is so opposed to the system of relic-
tous truth that In our times is termed
distinctively Christian. The appro-
priation by the Jew of those princi-
pies of pure and central Christianity
that are the glory of the truth as it
has been revealed of God In Jesus
Christ would be the exceeding story
of the coming ages and the fairest
possession OF the chosen people of
the Lord
The birth OF Jesus was the cul-
mination of divine self-revelation. In
the personality and the message OF
the Christ God gave the fullness OF
the divine self-explication. Jesus is
the objectiiying of the Godhead be-
fore the very eyes of humanity. In
Him Jehovah unfolds the personality
OF divinity. In His message is pro-
claimed the mind OF God for the wei.
fare and sanctifying of the world.
Jesus is the declaration of the diyin-
ity, the humanity, the fatherhood OF
God. And in the person OF the Christ
is completed the long endeavor of
loving ard patient Father to impress
Himself upon the minds, the hearts,
the lives OF His wayward, errant chill
dren. Throughout all the ages and
in the lives of all His people God had
been revealing God to man. Here
and there, as Israel heard the voice
OF Jehovah, there arose men OF pre-
vision, men Of insight, men of intense
spiritual discernment to declare to
the duller and less spiritually acute
multitude the meaning and the i'm
port of Gods seif-revealment.
Throughout all this history OF the
chosen people of God Divinity strove
in diverse and incessant fashion to
impart to the consciousness OF man
Kind frua nndarofa ndfu1 ~ Him