Many are the outward testimonies which God hath given to the gospel of his Son; many witnesses have confirmed it from the time that Christ appeared in the flesh, to the day when St. John wrote this epistle. If we trace his life from the cradle in the manger to his cross and the grave, we shall find the rays of divinity still shining round his doctrine and his works, still pointing to his person, and proving his commission with a convincing and resistless light. At his birth the witnessing angels appeared in much brightness, and while the Son of God lay an infant below, his record was on high; for there appeared a strange new star, and was his witness in heaven. The wise men of the East were his witnesses, when they came from afar, and paid tributes and offerings, gold and incense to the God, the king of Israel. Simeon and Anna in the temple, by the Spirit of prophecy witnessed to the holy child Jesus. And the doctors with whom he disputed at twelve years old, were his witnesses that there was something in him more than man. At his baptism the Father and the Spirit witnessed to the Son of God; they told the world that this was He, the Messiah: The Father by a voice from heaven, saying, _This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased_; and the Spirit descending upon him like a dove. His life was a life of wonders, and each of them witnessed to the truth of his commission, and to the divinity of his doctrine. Every blind eye that he opened, saw and witnessed Jesus, and declared his divine power. Every one of the dead that he raised were his witnesses. They came from the land of silence to speak his glory, and to give a loud testimony to his mission from heaven. The devils themselves, when he drove them out of their possessions, confessed that he was Christ, _The holy one of God_; but he had no mind to accept their witness, and therefore forbade them to speak. Miracles attended him to the cross and the grave, and opened the grave again for him, and made a passage for him to his Father’s right hand. Nor did the witnesses of his person and of his doctrine then cease; for _that salvation which began to be spoken by Jesus the Lord_, was afterwards published _by those that heard him, God himself bearing them witness with signs and wonders_; as in Heb. ii. 3, 4. But all these still were outward witnesses to convince an unbelieving world. There is an inward witness that my text speaks of, that belongs to every true christian: _He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself._ And let us prepare now to examine whether our religion be true, and whether we are believers on the Son of God in truth, by searching after this inward witness; which we shall endeavour to explain, by considering these three things: