THOU shalt call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people from their sins." It is not my purpose even to try to explain those grandly simple words; for do we not frequently darken the counsel of the Lord by our expressions? I only wish to quote them—to say them over again, as it were, to some heart in search of the Savior, who might not else have thought of them, and to beg such an one to hear them, to read them, as the Word of God ought to be heard and read—with the hearing of faith.
How inexpressibly sweet to such an one are these words! You feel your need of a Savior; you feel your sins to be an intolerable burden to you, and, lo! here you are told of One whose very name is Savior—" Thou shalt call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people from their sins "—just what you desire, above all things, to be saved from.
It is sweet to observe that it is written “Thou shalt call His name JESUS From St. Luke we know that the same had been said also to Mary. Both Joseph and Mary were commanded to call Him JESUS, and “He was called JESUS." You are invited to call Him JESUS. Will you not do so—at His feet, in the solitude of your heart? Will you not say to Him, "Jesus, my Savior, who died for me "? Ah! those only who have experienced it know the sweetness of this actual contact with the Lord—this speaking of heart to heart with Him. It is eternal life to know Him thus, and the beginning of eternal days of joy. And sweet to His ear will be that breathing of His name by your lips, by your heart, for the first time. How does a mother feel when she hears her name of “Mother " attempted for the first time by her darling child? Only a mother knows. And who may tell the Lord's joy when He hears His name of Jesus-Savior breathed by one for whom He died?
“Breathed by thee 'twill seem unto Him
Sweeter far than any other,
As when by her babe first spoken
Seems her own name to a mother."
E. B.