prophecy. His search goes back many years. He finds the first Gospel
promise. It was made while Adam and Eve, having sinned, were yet in the
Garden of Eden. It was the promise of a Saviour to come from heaven to
earth, through whom they and their descendants could be saved from the
power of Satan and the consequences of sin. We do not know how much our
first parents understood of this coming One: but we feel assured that
they believed this promise, and through repentance and faith in this
Saviour, they at last entered a more glorious paradise than the one they
lost. That promise faded from the minds of many of their descendants and
wickedness increased. But God had not forgotten it. John could find it
renewed by him to Abraham, in the words, "In thee shall all the families
of the earth be blessed,"--meaning that the Messiah should be the
Saviour of all nations, Gentiles as well as Jews. The promise was
renewed to Isaac, the son of Abraham; and then repeated to his son
Jacob, in the same words spoken to his grandfather. Jacob on his dying
bed told Judah what God had revealed to him, that the Messiah should be
of the tribe of which Judah was the head.

Many years later God made it known to David that the Messiah should be
one of his descendants. This was a wonder and delight to him as he
exclaimed, "Who am I, O Lord God, and what is mine house! for Thou hast
spoken of Thy servant's house for a great while to come." John must
have been taught by his mother that they were of the honored house of
David. They, in common with other Jews, believed that the "great while
to come" was near at hand.

John read in Isaiah of her who would be the mother of the Messiah,
without thought that she was his aunt Mary. He read that she should call
her son Immanuel, meaning "God with us," without thinking this was
another name for his cousin Jesus. John would find other names