Rightly does God's church honour this day, the birth-tide of the great Baptist, for the many wonders which happened at his birth. God's archangel Gabriel announced his birth to Zacharias his father, and his high honours, and his illustrious life. The child in his mother's womb knew the voice of Mary, the parent of God; and in the womb yet closed, betokened with prophetic joy the salutary advent of our Redeemer. At his birth he removed from his mother her barrenness, and his name unbound the tongue of his father, who by his own want of belief had been made dumb. The holy church celebrates the birth-tide of three persons,--of Jesus, who is God and man, and of John his messenger, and of the blessed Mary his mother. Of other chosen {355} persons, who, through martyrdom, or through other holy merits, have gone to the kingdom of God, we celebrate as their birth-tide their last day, which, after the fulfilment of all their labours, brought them forth victorious to eternal life; and the day on which they were born to this present life we let pass unheeded, because they came hither to hardships, and temptations, and divers perils. The day is memorable to the servants of God which sends his saints, after victory won, to eternal joy from all afflictions, and which is their true birth; not tearful as the first, but exulting in eternal life. But the birth-tide of Christ is to be celebrated with great care, through which came our redemption. John is the ending of the old law and the beginning of the new, as Jesus said of him, "The old law and the prophets were till the coming of John." Afterwards began the gospel-preaching. Now, on account of his great holiness, his birth is honoured, as the archangel promised his father with these words, "Many shall rejoice in his birth-tide." Mary, the parent of God, is like to none other, for she is maiden and mother, and bare him who created her and all creatures: therefore is she well worthy that her birth should be honourably celebrated. The relatives bestowed on the child the name of Zacharias, but the mother contradicted them by words, and the dumb father by writing; because the angel who had announced that he was to come, had, by God's direction, given him the name of JOHN. The dumb father could not have informed his wife how the angel had bestowed a name on his child, but by revelation of the Spirit of God the name was known to her. Zacharias is interpreted, 'Mindful of God;' and John, 'God's grace;' because he preached to men the grace of God, and that Christ was to come, who directs all the earth with his grace. He was sent before the Lord, as the day-star goes before the sun, as the beadle before the judge, as the Old Testament before the New; for the Old Law was {357} as a shadow, and the New Testament is truth through the grace of Jesus.