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On my own part, and on the part of those among us who are desirous to have expressed in a compendious form the primary grounds of that belief which makes them not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, I shall give (beginning for the most part in modern and non-theological language) an answer to that question of questions for every age, "What think ye of Christ?" That answer will land us at last on the highest summit of theological speculation.

I. "What think ye of Christ?" THAT HE IS EXCEPTIONAL IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD.

1. The holiest men are ever most conscious of their own sinfulness. Sublime dissatisfaction with self is the peculiarity of the Christian saint.

2. Jesus is the solitary exception to this rule. Besides the testimony both of enemies and of friends to the fact of His perfect innocence and sinlessness, we have His own witness. No utterance of conscious sin, no half-hid confession. He never includes Himself among sinners. We think, then, that Christ is unique and without parallel.

II. WE "THINK" THAT THE EXCEPTIONAL MAN HAS ENDOWED US WITH EXCEPTIONAL FRUITS, WITH BENEFITS UNPARALLELED. Not merely fruits of thought, art, literature.

1. Christ's living influence is yearly sending forth missionaries to the most abject tribes upon the earth.

2. Christ's teaching and example furnish a perpetual motive for tending the sick — perpetuating His miracles of healing.

3. Christ did not merely preach a doctrine: He founded a Church, to be the home of charity. Is she not, with her ministries for the poor, like the mother whom we have seen on Alpine or Pyrenean ridges, as she passes some razor-like edge, knitting for her little ones while she goes, though her heart and eye are up among the clouds?

4. Who shall say what Christ gives daily to those who receive Him?

(a)  Elevation above sordid selfishness.

(b)  Resignation.

(c)  Joy.

III. WE "THINK" OF CHRIST THAT HE IS "FIRST-BORN FROM THE DEAD."

1. The resurrection of Christ is not a fraud — not a singular recovery of a lacerated and tortured man, awakened from a death-like swoon by the coolness of the rocky chamber, or by the pungency of the spices l We have to account for cowards turned into heroes; for the faith that overcame the world.

2. Nor is the resurrection of Christ the projection of creative enthusiasm. The Church is too real for a foundation of mist. Faith did not create the resurrection: the resurrection created faith. We think, then, that as Christ was exceptional in His life, and in the benefits He conferred on humanity, so was He in His victory over the grave.

IV. THIS EXCEPTIONAL MAN MUST HAVE HAD AN EXCEPTIONAL ORIGIN. He is the Son of God (Luke 1:35). He is the Word of God (John 1:1). "And the Word was God."

V. CHRIST IS THE WISDOM OFGOD.

VI. HE IS VERY MAN. His delights are with the sons of Adam.

(Bishop William Alexander.)

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KJV: Saying, What think ye of Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The Son of David.

WEB: saying, "What do you think of the Christ? Whose son is he?" They said to him, "Of David."