2. Propitiation

Not only does God propose to give me that which will fit me for His presence, but he says, Sinner, you have something about you that will keep you out of my presence. So He sends His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. “Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us." When did He give Him? When we were sinners. I have got the positive and the negative side in the gospel; the positive, in what God gives,—the moment you believe, you have it; the negative is, my sins are all taken away. He sent His Son, a propitiation for our sins. Do you believe that? The ninth verse gives us His life; the tenth gives us His death. On the cross Jesus makes propitiation for sin. He was made sin who knew no sin. He was there, pouring out His soul unto death, meeting all God's claims against sin. Look at it; the Son of the very God you have sinned against, has made propitiation for the very sin that would have brought you into eternal damnation. Now He is exalted and gone on high; the veil is rent; He is gone back as man; the work is all done for which He came to die. Atonement has been effected by Christ, accepted by God, and the fruit—peace—is to be enjoyed by the believing sinner.
What about your sins? you may say. They were borne by Christ. There is the proof of the love of God to me—of the love of Christ, “God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." Sin was condemned and sins were blotted out when Christ made propitiation for sin. "Herein is love." Do you want a greater or a better proof of love? The heart that believes can say— I have now got what I had not, and I have lost what I had; I have got life, and lost my sins.
Dear reader, have you been scraping your poor heart to make it fit for God? Oh! but you say It is so simple this way. Yes, it is so simple, so true, because it is so divine. Will you refuse it therefore? There is near to you peace, pardon, salvation—fruit of the Saviour's love.