interested in or concerning Himself with the minutiae of human life; who
can conceive God as caring for a solar system or a planet, but not as
caring for a baby. Surely it is a strange notion of God that thinks of
Him as estimating values in terms of weight and measure: surely much
more intelligible is the Gospel presentation of Him as concerned with
spritual values and exercising that minute care over human life which is
best expressed by the word _Father_. It is very significant that as the
volume of revelation unrolls, the earlier notions of God as Ruler,
Governor, King, give way to the notion of Father, until in our Lord's
presentation of the character of God it is His Fatherhood which stands
in the forefront. What our Lord emphasises in the character of God are
precisely the qualities of love and care and sympathy which the word
Father connotes.

And nowhere do we see this loving care of God which we call His
Providence better set out for our study than in the detailed preparation
which preceded and attended the birth of His Son into this world. There
was that preparation of the Mother who was to be the source of the
humanity of the Child Jesus which we have been dwelling upon; there was
also the preparation for the proper guardianship of both Mother and
Child during the years of Jesus' immaturity. There are certain things
which are self-evident when once we turn our minds to them; and it is
thus self-evident that the care of our Lord and of His Blessed Mother
would require the preparation of the man to whom they should be
committed. In the state of society into which our Lord was born, He and
His Mother would need active guardianship of a peculiar nature. The man
who should provide for our Lord's infancy must be a man, in the nature
of the case, who was receptive of spiritual monitions and devoted to the
will of God. It was a delicate matter to live before the world as the
husband of Mary of Nazareth, and to live before God as the guardian of