"No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him" (John 1:18).

The Lord is referred to as "the Son of God" in various respects in the Scriptures. He is so called as being born of the virgin (Luke 1:35). He is such by divine decree, as in resurrection (Psa. 2:7; Acts 13:33). He is the Son, and yet has obtained the name of Son (Heb. 1:1-3). Matthew and Mark first notice His Sonship of God at His baptism. Luke goes farther back, and notices it at His birth. But John goes back farther still, even to the immeasurable, unspeakable distance of eternity, and declares His Sonship "in the bosom of the Father."

Sadly, there are some who deny this precious truth of the eternal Sonship of the Lord. There are those who would tell God that He knew not a Father’s joy in that bosom, and who would tell our Lord that He knew not a Son’s joy as He lay in that bosom from all eternity. I cannot join in this. If there are persons in the Godhead, as we know there are, are we not to know also that there are relationships among them? Can we dispense with such a thought? Is there not revealed to faith the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit? the Son begotten, and the Spirit proceeding? Indeed there is. The persons in that glory are not independent, but related. Nor is it beyond our measure to say that the great archetype of love, the blessed model or original of all affection, is found in that relationship.

Can I be satisfied with the unbelieving thought that there are not persons in the Godhead, and that Father, Son, and Spirit are only different lights in which the One Person is presented? The substance of the gospel would be destroyed by such a thought. And can I be satisfied with the unbelieving thought that these persons are not related? The love of the gospel would be dimmed by such a thought.

The bosom of the Father was an eternal habitation, enjoyed by the Son, in the ineffable delight of the Father. One has called it "the hiding place of love, of inexpressible love which is beyond glory; for glory may be revealed, this cannot."

"Lamb of God, Thy Father’s bosom
Ever was Thy dwelling-place!"

Let us not surrender such a wonderful truth to the thoughts of men. Even the Jews may rebuke the difficulty that some have regarding this truth. They felt that the Lord’s asserting His Sonship amounted to a making of Himself equal with God. So, instead of Sonship implying a secondary or inferior person, in their thought it asserted equality (John 5:17,18; 10:30-36).

"No man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father" (Luke 10:22). This is a sentence which may well check our reasonings. Also, the word that the eternal life was manifested to us to give us fellowship with the Father and the Son (1 John 1:2,3), distinctly utters the inestimable mystery of the Son being of the Godhead, having "eternal life" with the Father.

But further, can the love of God be understood according to Scripture if this Sonship be not owned? Does not that love get its character from that very doctrine? Are not our hearts challenged on the ground of it? "God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son" (John 3:16). Again, "In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.. . . We have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world" (1 John 4:9-14).

Does not this love lose its unparalleled glory if this truth is questioned? How would we answer the man who would tell us that it was not His own Son whom God spared not, but gave Him up for us all? How would it wither the heart to hear that such a One was only His Son as born of the virgin, and that those words, "He that spared not His own Son" (Rom. 8:32), are to be read as human, and not as divine!

Was it with his servant, or with a stranger, or with one born in his house merely, that Abraham walked to Moriah? Was it with an adopted son, or with his own son, his very son, his only son, whom he loved? We know how to answer these inquiries, I do not know how I could speak of the Son loving me and giving Himself for me (Gal. 2:20), if I did not receive Him by faith as Son in the bosom of the Father, Son in the glory of the Godhead.

May our hearts find blessing in meditating upon the eternal "Son of God, who loved [us] and gave Himself for [us]."

(Condensed from The Son of God.)