Such is the passage of prophecy, in the heart of which the prophecy of the Son of the Virgin is contained. We have seen every jot and every tittle of it fulfilled. It is a literal prophecy literally accomplished in all its parts. Ephraim is broken from being a people; from the set time, three score and five years after the utterance of the prophecy, Ephraim hath ceased to be a people. Rezin and Remaliah’s son were cut off before the lad Shearjasub could discern between good and evil. The house of David hath been in distress and humiliation, the people of Judah and Benjamin under captivity and oppression, the Holy Land under wasteness and desecration, and continue so until this day. In the midst of such disastrous tidings, such violence of woe, is the birth of Immanuel, the Virgin’s Son, introduced as a sign, token, and surety. That the evils of woe poured upon David’s house, and David’s throne, and David’s people, and David’s land, should not utterly overwhelm them, should not abide forever, but have an accomplishment and an end. That time, place, and persons should be left for the accomplishment of those better promises, that double recompense of blessings and eternal glory which is yet to rest upon all these humbled and oppressed things, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord, when all confederacies and associations of all countries against the land of Immanuel, shall be broken in pieces, and shall come to nought for (because of) Immanuel—Isaiah 8: 10; when the government shall be upon the shoulders of the Child that is born unto them, when he shall sit upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom to order it, and to establish it with justice and with judgment from henceforth, even for ever, —Isaiah 9: 6-7. Therefore, O Jew, who believest in the Son of Mary, be comforted and reassured, for the sign hath been given. But if thou believest not, then walk on in darkness; for thou seest not the sign of the preservation of David’s house. And thou, O Christian, who believest in the sign, believe in the thing whereof it is the sign; and no more doubt that David’s house shall be re-established in Jerusalem, in the Holy Land, and that Immanuel, God with us (then indeed with us, no longer away from us,) shall sit on David’s throne, than thou doubtest the other parts of this veritable prophecy.

From this prophecy thus literally interpreted, I make this inference, that it is a grievous error to say, as men do now say, that prophecy is only to be understood when it is accomplished; to say that it is idle, or worse than idle, to attempt to understand it till then; for surely Ahaz well knew what this burden betokened to him, to his confederated enemies, and to Ephraim; or if he did not, it was a blindness of the understanding brought on by a perversity of the will, in which also consisteth, as I deem, much of our present ignorance of prophecy. Like Ahaz, we will not have a sign; like Ahaz, we weary both God and man; like Ahaz, we regard not the prophetic word; and like Ahaz, the church will come to destruction for this very offence. And if the sign itself, that the Virgin Mary should conceive, which is the nucleus of the prophecy, should have been hidden from the understandings of men before the coming of Christ, whereof we cannot now with accuracy judge, this also was for want of faith, not for want of simplicity or sincerity in the language; for want of that faith which Abraham had when he believed God, that he and Sarah should have a son in their old age: and this want of faith proceedeth from doubting concerning the power of God to change the laws and ordinances of nature; and this doubt leads men to degrade and explain away the prophecy until it become commensurate with the ordinary methods of cause and effect. But if the Jews had believed the word exactly as it is written, it would have proved to them a sure and almost infallible sign whereby to know Immanuel, and knowing him to believe in him, and to believe in the restoration of their estate by the Man who should be born of the Virgin. In like manner, if we could bring ourselves to believe in the coming of Christ, and in all those things which he is to accomplish exactly as they are written, we would see a fulfilment of them in the time of the Lord, and even in this present time, we would see all things concurring with that progression of signs, which is to draw on the fulfilment. But if we will not believe, we cannot be established, but shall surely perish in our unbelief.

My second observation is with respect to the great error of those who say that God never intended that we should know the times and the seasons of the fulfilment of the prophecy; whereas he gives both a period of years and a date in the life-time of a child then before the king, within which the events of the prophecy should be accomplished. But the true cause of all these falsehoods is, that men have such slight and unreal notions of God’s being and providence, their faith in God is so much weaker than their faith in time, place, and circumstance, that they cannot believe in any word of God which comes into competition with their belief in the ordinary course of events. When the course of events has made the prophecy to become history, they can credit the prophecy because it coincides with the history; but until such coincidence, they have no faith in it at all. Now, I would rather, for my part, have a firm faith in God, as foreseeing, and overruling, and predicting all, though my interpretations thereof should, in most instances, be wrong, than have no faith in God as overruling all, though I should never be detected in a false expectation. What I am about to say may seem extreme to many, but I believe it, and therefore will say it; and it is a solemn word with which this first interpretation may be well concluded. That those who have attempted to interpret prophecy, or love to hear it interpreted, are the only persons who have had actual faith in prophecy. And now, may the Lord bless this endeavour to open his prophetic word, and commend it to the hearts of all his people! —Proph. Exp.

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