Plain Sermons by Contributors to, Tracts for the Times Psalm 19:4 Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them has he set a tabernacle for the sun, There is no doubt that this verse describes the nativity of our Lord. The sun, that we see in the eastern heavens, is made to us an image of our incarnate Lord and Saviour, issuing from the Virgin's womb to be the light and life of the Church. It is not a new or strange thing for Holy Scripture to give such a turn as this to the works of nature, the things which we see daily. Compare the figure in Malachi. "Unto you that fear My name shall the Sun of Righteousness arise, with healing in His wings." And the figure used by Zacharias, "The Day spring from on high hath visited us." 1. Everyone may understand that as the sun is beyond comparison the brightest object in these outward and visible heavens, so the great privilege of the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom and Church of God's saints, is to have the Sun of Righteousness, God-made man, especially present, abiding and reigning in it. The same is true of every soul which is inwardly and spiritually conformed to God's holy Church. It is lull of Christ, of Jesus Christ Himself, silently and mysteriously coming in and dwelling there. 2. As Christ is a sun to his Church by His glorious abiding in it, so the manner in which He came to be so is likened to "a bridegroom coming out of his chamber," a figure for Christ's marrying the nature of God to the nature of man, by taking on Him our flesh. Our Saviour, God made man for us, born for us, crucified and risen again, fills the whole Church and the whole world. Christ is whole in His whole Church, and in every part and member of it, as the sun in the firmament shines impartially on the whole world beneath him, and in his circuit visits each part in turn with his warming and life-giving beams. But Christ's faithful people are more particularly made aware of His presence by the outward means of grace and the visible ordinances of His holy Catholic Church. (Plain Sermons by Contributors to "Tracts for the Times. ") Parallel Verses KJV: Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun, |
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