“This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”  During His life, while He submitted to every trial and temptation to which, humanity was liable, “that in all things He might be like His brethren,” yet never was evidence wanting of a dignity and glory which were divine.  He was hungry, but fed thousands; wearied and asleep amidst the storm, but He rebuked the winds and waves, so that there was a great calm; He was tempted of the devil for forty days, but Satan did homage to His dignity, by offering Him as a bribe the kingdoms of the world, while His grandeur was revealed in the command, “Get thee behind me, Satan.”  He was so poor that pious women ministered to Him of their substance, and so sorrowful that He often wept; yet He dried the tears of thousands, healed all who came to Him of every disease, and by a word of power raised the dead, from their bed, from their bier, and even when corruption had begun to do its loathsome work.  He had His days of darkness, when He could say, “Now is my soul troubled;” yet a voice from heaven even then witnessed to His glory.  He washed the feet of His disciples, yet it was at the very moment when, “knowing that God had given all things into his hands, that he came from God, and went to God.”  He died and was buried, but though, during all the hours which marked that saddest of all tragedies, there were signs of human woe and weakness, as if “Himself He could not save,” yet what signs of dignity and superhuman majesty!  For He was addressed on the cross as a King by a dying criminal, and as a King He promised to save him; while the darkened sky, the rending rocks, and all the august circumstances which attended His humiliation, proclaimed, with the centurion, “Truly this was the Son of God!” He lay in the grave, and His body received the tears and affectionate ministrations of attached friends; but an angel descended and rolled away the stone; the Roman guard became as dead men; “the Lord was risen indeed!” and He appeared to His disciples, and so overcame the unbelief of Thomas by His very presence, bearing the marks of His human sufferings, that the doubter fell down and “worshipped Him,” saying, “My Lord, and my God!” Jesus remained on earth for forty days, and we still “behold the man.”  He conversed familiarly with His apostles, ate and drank with them, and instructed them in the things pertaining to His kingdom:  but He ascended to heaven before their eyes, while angels announced His second coming; and soon the descent of the Holy Ghost, with the great ingathering to the Church which followed, testified to the truth of the apostolic preaching, that Jesus was the Son of God, and that all power was given to Him in heaven and on earth!