”Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and they shall call his name Immanuel” Matthew 1:23
The clearest manifestation of God to us is revealed in Jesus Christ
(John 1:18). His eternal Godhead is also manifest in the works of
creation (Rom. 1:20). The knowledge of God in creation, however, is not
able to restrain the vain imaginations and idolatrous conceptions of
God that lie in men’s hearts. Also, much of the eternal Godhead is
manifested in his works of providence (Job 9:10-11). Sometimes God was
working forward or before Job; sometimes backwards, or behind him;
sometimes on his right hand, sometimes at his left hand. Job followed
him up and down that he might understand God, and the reason and design
of all his works. But he could not perceive it. We also see the
eternal Godhead in his righteous and holy law; but this manifestation of
God frightened those who saw it at first (Heb. 12:21). The clearest,
sweetest, and most comfortable manifestation of God to us is made only
in Jesus Christ, who is ‘the image of the invisible God’ (Col. 1:15).
In Christ, God has revealed himself as no other means can. Christ is
the exact copy or character of the Father’s person and perfections (Heb.
1:3). When Philip desired for Christ to show him the Father, Jesus
said: ‘Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. Believe me, I am in the
Father and the Father is in me’ (John 14:9, 11). In the works of
creation, God is above us; in his works of providence, he is outside us;
in the law, he is against us; in himself, he is invisible to us. Only
in Christ is he Immanuel, God manifested in our flesh. He is God in us,
God with us, and God for us. Therefore, no man ever did or ever can
understand anything of God truly, that is, upon a saving account, except
in and by Jesus Christ (1 Tim. 6:16).
Quoted from "Voices from the Past", Puritan Devotional Readings, edited by Richard Rushing, Page 171
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