Seven hundred years before our Lord Jesus was born, in Bethlehem, the Prophet Isaiah foretold that a man would live in the wilderness, and would cry aloud, "Prepare ye the way of the Lord! Make straight in the desert a highway for our God! . . . The grass withereth and the flower fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand for ever! . . . O Jerusalem that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with strength; lift it up, be not afraid; say unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God!" That was the prophecy, and we read the fulfilment in the Gospels of Matthew and John. "In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judæa, and saying, Repent ye: for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight!" Do you not think that John the Baptist must have felt greatly honoured to know that he was this messenger of the Lord? He was the cousin of the Lord Jesus. And before John's birth, an angel told his father, Zacharias, that his name was to be John, and that he should be great in the sight of the Lord, and should preach in the spirit and power of Elijah, and make ready a people prepared for the Lord. It was John the Baptist who, you remember, had the great honour of baptizing the Lord Jesus; and it was he who uttered one of the most wonderful sentences in the Bible: "Behold the Lamb of God, Which taketh away the sin of the world." PROPHECY OF CHRIST'S BIRTH. Isa. ix. 6.—Matt. ii. 11. "Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judæa, in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came Wise Men from the east to Jerusalem"; and as they entered the city, their first question astonished everyone. "Where is He that is born King of the Jews?" they asked. "For we have seen His star in the east, and we are come to worship Him." Herod was the king then, placed there by the Romans, and he did not like to hear that there could be another king! He sent at once for the scribes, and demanded of them where Christ should be born. So they told him that Micah had prophesied in their Scriptures that Christ should be born in Bethlehem. And Herod was so anxious to make sure of this, that he sent the Wise Men to inquire in Bethlehem, and said he would come to worship Him. And the Star moved before the Wise Men till it came and stood over where the young Child was. Then the Wise Men saw the Holy Babe, with Mary, His mother; and they fell down and worshipped Him, and opened their treasures, and gave Him the precious gifts they had brought from the east. In Isaiah vii. 14 the Jews were told that the mother of the Lord should be a virgin; and in Jeremiah xxiii. 5 that He should be of the royal house of David. And now comes the fulfilment of all these prophecies off seven hundred years before. He was born of a virgin, in Bethlehem, David's city.