Page:Christ the saviour of the world (1).pdf/5

 I. The world needed a Saviour; otherwiſe one had not been provided for them by him who does nothing in vain. It was a ſick world caſt into a deſperate illneſs by eating of the forbidden fruit; and needed a phyſician to cure the diſtemper. Mat. ix. 12, 'Jeſus ſaid unto them. They that would be whole need not a phyſician, but they that are ſick.' It was a curſed world, ſtaked down under wrath by the ſentence of the broken law; and needed a Saviour to remove the curſe, and bring in the bleſſing. Acts iii. 26. 'God having raiſed up his Son Jeſus, ſent him to bleſs you,' &c. It was a loſt world, loſt to God, loſt to themſelves, loſt to all good, loſt and periſhing under the wrath of God; and it needed one to ſeek and ſave them, Luke xix. 10. 'For the Son of man is come to ſeek and to ſave that which was loſt.'

2. None, of inferior dignity to the Son of God, could be the Saviour of the world. No man, nor angel was able to ſuſtain the character of Saviour of a loſt world: The work which lay to that office, was above the reach of the whole creation, Rev. v. 3. 'And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon,' Here was a trial of the divine love to man; his caſe was hopeleſs and helpleſs from all the creatures; and it iſſued in that. 'God ſo loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,' John iii. 16,