Divine Love and Its Fruits

We have now come to that period in the history of (God’s ways with man when His love as perfect is manifested in connection with the cross of Christ. The whole condition of man from Adam to Christ has been looked at in every way; fall trial has been made in the long patience of God, of what man was, and is, and the result has proved him to be without one good thing towards God. This is man’s—all men’s—sad, sad condition. Four thousand years of probation, and every fair trial under all the possible circumstances in which man could be placed, have demonstrated his true character and condition. But he is not only without one good thing towards a merciful and long-suffering God, but there is in his heart and in all his ways the presence of every evil thing. Negatively and positively, in principle and in practice, man is essentially ungodly.
God had known this from the beginning; but it was not until after it had been fully proved that He takes His place towards the sinner in Christ Jesus, according to the greatness of His love and the riches of His grace. This is a point of immense practical importance in the history of souls. How often we have found a young believer greatly troubled and long kept from peace with God, through experiencing so much within that is contrary to Him. How can I believe God loves me—how can I believe He hears my prayers—how can I believe that I am His child with all this indwelling sin? This perplexity is natural, and so far it is right to be troubled on account of indwelling evil; but Satan’s object is to keep the soul in this state, and to turn the mind in upon self for evidences, and so to harass and perplex the feeble in faith. Such souls have not yet learned the grand truth which the apostle is here discussing, and which is now before us—perfect love to the sinner, consequent upon, not before, the trial of man, and founded on the finished work of Christ. When this grand, consoling, peace-giving truth is known, all doubts, fears, and perplexities must immediately disappear. Nothing short of perfect rest and cloudless joy would fill the soul, and nothing could disturb its sweet repose. It is one with Christ in resurrection, beyond the reach of every foe, and possessed of His “unsearchable riches”
Had God manifested His love towards man before He had proved what was in him, He might have been afterward disappointed, as men speak, with his ingratitude and disobedience; and ice might reasonably enough have been in doubt as to what God would now say, and whether He would not turn away from us and judge us as hopelessly evil. But oh! blessed! precious! yea, thrice precious truth to the soul! It was not until man had been fully tried in every way, and his terrible guilt consummated in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, God’s well-beloved Son, that His love is fully revealed. If God can love, and does love the sinner in Christ Jesus after this expression of his hatred, rebellion, and wickedness, what must that love be! Again the heart exclaims, as it rests in the effulgent beams of that love which can never be darkened by a cloud, 011, mighty, marvelous, wondrous,, matchless love! And like an ocean without a shore; it is measureless, boundless, whence flow the ten thousand streams of living grace for the refreshment of the weary by the way, and for the establishment of our souls in faith and holiness.
It was this love which overflowed the heart of the apostle as he wrote the first eleven verses of this chapter—the richest perhaps, in divine love that have been given to us. “ For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet per-adventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
This is the gospel of the grace of God—God’s new principle in dealing with man who now stands before Him as entirely lost. All His past ways with man, dispensational and personal, clown to the cross, only demonstrated him to be utterly alien in nature, and hopelessly bad in condition; consequently, the love that was henceforth displayed must be absolutely free and perfect. Nothing was ever found in man to induce but everything to dissuade the manifestation of divine love. But now all is changed. God retires into the rights of His own sovereignty; grace reigns; but not on the ruins of law and justice; not in setting aside the claims of God, nor in lightly passing over the guilt of man; but through accomplished righteousness towards God, and eternal life to the lost sinner by Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior. “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.” Rom. 5:20, 21.
This, we affirm, is the gospel on the divine side; the effects on the human side will be manifested in genuine faith, godly repentance, and a life of holiness, and would to God it were better understood; for when received in simplicity every question is settled. If I know that He loves me with a perfect love, after He has estimated all my sin and guilt, then no evil can ever spring up in my heart that He knew not beforehand, and that He has not fully judged in the cross of Christ and put out of His sight forever. But here it may be asked, Did God not love the sinner before the death of Christ? Most assuredly He did. Perfect love always dwelt in the heart of God towards man. To speak of the death of Christ as exciting or procuring the love of God towards the sinner, is a pernicious doctrine and without the shadow of foundation in scripture. On the contrary, the death of the Lord Jesus is represented as the expression of God’s love towards us, and the character, or greatness of that love, is revealed by the condition of those for whom Christ died. Love, full, perfect, and active, always dwelt in His heart; and its grand object ever was the reconciliation of man to Himself. God never was the enemy of man, therefore He needed not to be reconciled; nay, rather, “ He was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” Innumerable passages rush into the mind in proof of this rest-giving truth; such as, “ In this was manifested the love of God towards us, because that God sent his only-begotten Hon into the world, that we might live through him. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.” 1 John 4:9-19.
Yes, what a mercy for us, this love was always there; and although rejected, it was not weakened. But the death of Jesus opened the way for its full revelation, and for the accomplishing of all the purposes of grace. There was no link between God and man in the flesh; for all His love, He had only received hatred; no response was ever found in the human heart to His most tender appeals. But Christ glorified God about sin in His death; He accomplished all righteousness; He met the highest claims of heaven, and the deepest necessities of man; the law was magnified and the promise established in His Person; and He laid a righteous foundation in His death and resurrection for the perfect display of the divine nature and character, and that in respect of sin. Now God takes His own place, and manifests what He is towards the sinner in Christ Jesus. We have seen what man is, now we have to see what God is, and what the fruits of His love are.
Our attention is now directed by the apostle to what we may call the first-fruits of perfect love—the death of Christ as an object for faith outside ourselves. “ For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” No more difficult truth for man to believe was ever revealed than this. It is so opposed to all human thoughts, feelings, affections, and ways, that he cannot understand it. Who ever heard of love lavishing its choicest gifts on unrelenting but powerless enemies? Thou shalt do this, and thou shalt not do that, or, abide the consequences, man can understand; it is consistent with his reason. But for love to say, after it has proved that there is nothing in its object but hatred, and a hatred too, unchangeable, and cruel as death—I have opened the flood-gates of heaven that my love may flow forth in unmeasured, unhindered fullness for your eternal happiness, far transcends the loftiest thoughts of the human mind. That God should love the righteous, the good and the holy, excites no surprise; but that He should love the unholy, the unrighteous and the evil, and give His own beloved Son to die the death they deserved, must ever shine forth throughout the countless ages of eternity as the wonder of all wonders.
But who could believe it? even with this oracle of love, man has found something to find fault with and to complain of. He cannot bear the idea of being proclaimed powerless. He would sooner far believe that he is ungodly than that he is weak. By trying, he hopes to cease being ungodly, and to become better, and he refuses to bow to the humiliating truth, that he is wholly “ without strength.” But this is where the gospel begins, and where man must be brought to if his soul is to be saved. He may struggle long against the truth, as many do, thinking they can do something, or at least feel that they are growing better by their own doings, such as prayer, reading the word, and attending to the means of grace. But no! God will wait till the awakened sinner bows to the result of his own history as written by God Himself powerless for good; morally and spiritually dead; condemned already, and lying under the guilt of the death of Christ.
This then, we repeat, is the gospel; not what man is, not what God requires of man, but what God is, after He has proved man to be both powerless and godless. This believed, the light of heaven fills the soul. With his first breath the believer may exclaim; “ God loves me with a perfect love, notwithstanding all I am and have done; Christ died for me, and all the benefits of His death are mine; now my salvation depends, not on my own consistency—though I ought to be consistent—but on the unchangeable love of God, and the eternal efficacy of the blood of Christ. I have simply to rest in His love, and to rejoice in the effects of the work of Christ, which fits me for His holy presence.”
But what must be the guilt of those who reject the Lord Jesus, full of all grace and goodness, yea and of God Himself in reconciling love? Everything in which blessing can be found is rejected, and the soul must eternally perish by its own suicidal hand. The very remembrance of such love, and so slighted; of such opportunities, and so neglected; must give vehemence to the flames that shall never be quenched, and vitality to the worm that shall never die. May the Lord have mercy on my unconverted reader, and lead him to take his true place at the feet of Jesus, and to believe what is so plainly revealed, “ When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.”
Divine Love and Its Fruits
The expression, “in due time” seems to convey two distinct thoughts. 1. It was the time of man’s utmost need; his guilt had reached its highest height, and all was lost as to man. He was without strength to come out of this condition, although God under the law showed him the way. He had nothing to look for but wrath. 2. It was the “ due time” for the full manifestation of divine love in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Man had been thoroughly revealed, and nothing was found in him to draw forth the love of God, but everything to make God his judge; and to appear before God as a judge is everlasting condemnation. But in place of judgment He showed mercy. It was His due time to enter a scene of hopeless ruin, and bring salvation to (he lost. “ When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.” Gal. 4:4, 5.
The character of God’s love
Verses 7, 8. “ For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet peradventure for a good man some would am dare to die. But God commendeth his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” If the character and quality of love is to be determined by the character and condition of its object, how far divine love must transcend every illustration of human love! God only can love without a motive, save that which is within His own heart. Man must have a motive without, and his feelings and affections are thereby governed. He may be moved to esteem, to approval, by righteousness, and to affection by benevolence: but it is scarcely to be expected that any one would think of dying for a merely just or righteous man; though for a good man, a benefactor, such self-devotion might be found; but such love could not be surpassed among the children of men; this would be its strongest expression. “ But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”
What characterizes God’s love is His sending His own Son to die, not for the righteous, or even for the good, but for sinners, for those who were deserving His wrath, not His love. Yes, here we may pause for a moment, and wonder and adore. Man required a strong motive to draw forth his love; God had none. Fresh and full, pure and perfect, from His own heart—its native fountain—it flowed forth, and overflowed all the boundaries of human sin. “ Where sin abounded grace did much more abound.” There was nothing in man to call forth, but everything to hinder, the expression of His love; but the spring and the power were within, and no object without was needed to induce or draw it forth. God is love, and God only can thus love.
Do any inquire, Can God love sin? All answer, No. Can He love the sinner? Many hesitate to answer fearlessly. But what does the word say? God commendeth His love in not sparing His own Son. He thus commends, proves, makes manifest His love by Christ dying for sinners, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God. So that, speaking as a believer, I have the positive certainty of how much God loves me, and what He is to me, in spite of all that I am, or have been. It was after He knew all the evil that is in me, and of which I am guilty, that He gave His Son to die for me. This is the expression of His love to me, in so far as that love can be expressed. Thus the death of the Lord Jesus is the fullest proof of my sin, and of God’s love to me. But all my evil is judged and gone—gone forever—His love alone remains. What a resting-place for the conscience, as well as the heart! “ Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” God being righteous and holy, as truly as love, could not introduce me into His presence in my sins, therefore He laid them all on Jesus, who put them away on the cross. There I must look to see them all put away, not within; God has never said He would put them away from my heart while I am here. He looks to the cross, and sees the work finished, and so does faith: unbelief looks within, and judges by experience.
But is there not a sense, my anxious friend may inquire, in which the love of God is known and enjoyed in the heart? Most true, most blessedly true! But that is by faith, after the judgment of present things: and when Christ is before the heart as the hope of glory. Pardon and justification are viewed as past things; peace with God, and standing in grace, as present; waiting for glory as future. Then comes trial, sustained by faith in the power of the Holy Ghost.
“And not only so, but we glory in tribulation also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience experience; and experience hope; and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.” This is good and wholesome exercise for the Christian, but we must bear in mind that the Holy Spirit never points the soul to His own work in us—which is never finished while we are here—but to the work of Christ for us, which is finished—absolutely perfect—and outside ourselves.
“THE GOSPEL OF GOD.”
This, we love to repeat, is the gospel on God’s part, on the divine side. God loves the sinner. What a wonderful thing for an anxious soul to find that there is love in the heart of God for him—for one who had only thought of God as a judge ready to condemn. But now he finds that God loves him, that Christ has borne the punishment of sin in his stead, poured out His soul unto death, and put away sin; that He has risen again, has ascended into heaven; that God is glorified, and the Holy Ghost has come down to make His love known in the heart by faith, and to seal homo the work of Christ in the soul. This is more than something from God, such as justification, peace, and hope, or His tender care in tribulation; it is like God Himself coming to take up His abode in the heart. To enter into the full perception of God’s ways in grace with the sinner constitutes the believer’s highest enjoyment, opens up a vast field for the loftiest meditations, and the greatest activities of heart and mind in the scene around us. The Father’s love, the Savior’s grace, the Spirit’s power, are our associates in labor. The bright regions of glory, the dark regions of hell, the priceless value of the immortal soul, are the weighty motives which govern the evangelist.
Yet, strange to say, some have the temerity to speak of the gospel as if it were merely elementary truth, and only fit to be listened to by the unconverted or newly-awakened soul. But what have we hero before us? In the simple truth that “ Jesus came down to be a man, and die,” we have the revelation of Him who is infinite, of the God of love; and, we may say, of the depths of His heart, for He who lay deepest there God freely gave. Yet withal it is adapted to the simplest minds, and to the wants of every heart that knows its condition as lost under sin. “Thus the display of His love in the death of Christ comes down to the child, while it wholly transcends the highest soarings of poor but proud philosophy. There is the most profound truth, but it is embodied in facts which speak to every heart and conscience when the will has been dealt with by the Holy Spirit. While we were yet sinners Christ died for us; and in this God commends His own love toward us.”
The sinner that has been converted by means of this gospel has found a place of perfect rest; not merely because he is pardoned, or his debts paid; nor even in his faith, however genuine; nor in his repentance, however deep—and deep it will be when he knows what God is, and what He has been; nor in the work of the Spirit in him, though that has given him light and power; but far above all these he rises, and rests on the heart of God, through the finished work of Christ. As water rises to its level, so the living water that came down to the defiled Samaritan re-ascends to its source, giving the title and the capacity to enjoy the richest blessings which flow from that eternal spring. And as it was in her case, there is no better fitness to preach the gospel to others than the full enjoyment of it ourselves. Knowing the remedy for perishing souls, we must not conceal it. If we found a man lying on the road-side, dying from pain, and had a remedy at hand that would remove the pain and restore him to health, it would be wicked and cruel to withhold it. True, he might be slow to believe in the sincerity of our intentions, but we should not fail to entreat and beseech until we had persuaded him to try our cure. And knowing man’s love of the world, and his disinclination to attend to the spiritual concerns of his soul, we must entreat and beseech as those who see his danger, and carry with us a divine specific for every malady of his precious soul.
We have sometimes referred to the teaching of one to whom many are indebted, and we have profited by many a rich thought without acknowledging it—save to the Great Original—but as an earnest, fervent, beseeching gospel preacher he is less known. We give the following appeal—slightly abridged—as an example which we should think safe for the preacher to follow, and most suitable for the unsaved reader of “Things New and Old.” May he give good heed to it, and believe to the salvation of his soul.
“ Now, dear friends, I would just, in conclusion, ask you, Have you been led to come, as you are, ungodly sinners, to God? Not to bring your own righteousness, which is nothing but filthy rags; but have you come pleading the blood-shedding of the Lamb of God? If you have, assuredly there is peace for you, for that is a sure token that God is for you. Or have you been acting against God all your lives, and have never found peace? Are you still tormented with a guilty conscience, and are you still rejecting and refusing salvation? I would earnestly beseech you to consider the danger you are in, and I would ask you to look before you, and see where you are going, and what you are doing. You are wandering in the midst of the wide sea of this world, you are toiling through its waves, without a prospect of deliverance; and if persisted in, you will ere long sink down into the sleep of death, to wake in eternal misery.....
“But be of good cheer if your hearts are set on Christ: there is your stay, the anchor of your soul. If He is such, dear friends, stand forward for Him; be not ashamed to own your relationship to Him, your dependence on Him; be decided, cut short all expedients for deferring the bold acknowledgment of your being His; confess Him before men, act for Him, and live for Him in an ungodly world.....Be not debating within yourselves when you shall avow yourselves; do it at once, decidedly. Make the plunge, and trust God for the consequence. I know it by experience that an open, bold, confession of being Christ’s is more than half the struggle over. I know the devil tempts, and says, ‘ Ο don’t be too hasty, you might ruin the cause by over-forwardness; this is not the time to confess yourself openly, wait for another opportunity.’ But I say, dear friends, as one who knows, that if a man, in the strength of the Lord, is just brought to say to his companions and friends, ‘I am Christ’s, and I must act for Him,’ that he will not suffer what others will feel who are creeping on, fearful and afraid to avow Him whom they desire to serve. Believe me, my friends, it is as I say, by this decided and open opposition to the world: he may at first be laughed at, and mocked, but what of that? Christ was served so.....
“ Oh! I once more entreat you to be candid. Be open, be decided, confess Christ’s name on earth, and He will not be ashamed to confess your name before the whole assembled universe.”
Divine Love and Its Fruits
The apostle having established the great truth of the love of God and its effects, as demonstrated by the gift of Christ and His death for us, now reasons, in a divine way, as to the perfect security of the believer. Justification is his true state before God in virtue of the work of Christ: “ Being justified by his blood.” When it is said in the first verse of this chapter, “Being justified by faith;” the meaning is, not that we are saved by faith as a virtue, but that faith includes its object, which, in this connection, embraces the whole work of Christ, His death and resurrection. This being known to faith, the believer has peace with God, the enjoyment of His favor and the hope of glory. Thus we are brought by the risen Lord into association with Himself, and in the place where He Himself is gone, and in all His acceptance, our sins are all blotted out, annihilated by the work of Christ, and the heart, unburdened, rejoices in the Lord.
But this is not all; we pass through tribulation. God leads us into it and is with us in it. He is glorified in the trial. In place of the impatience of nature, there is the endurance of grace. The will is subdued, and we learn the true character of the scene in which we move, and through which we pass on our way home. The wheels of the soul are set in motion, and result in the hope of the glory of God. Divine love is now demonstrated, not only in the gift of Christ, but also in the gift of the Holy Ghost, and that love shed abroad in the heart. The believer has now a twofold security for his present blessing and future glory—the place which he has in God’s heart; and, oh! wondrous, marvelous, mysterious, truth! the place which He has chosen to occupy in the heart that has been cleansed by the blood of Jesus. “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.” This is the presence of the God of love in us. Thus know we the love of God both subjectively and objectively: we have the consciousness of the former; the latter we have displayed in the great public fact of the death of Christ for us.
the apostle’s conclusions.
From the freeness and greatness of the divine love as thus unfolded, the apostle draws the following most obvious conclusions. “ Much more then, being now justified by his blood, tee shall be saved from wrath through him. For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.” Verses 9, 10.
Much more, is emphatic and conclusive. The reasoning of the apostle is founded on the blood-shedding of the Lord Jesus; “Being now justified by his blood.” This is an expression of peculiar weight and solemnity, and ought not to be passed lightly over. It gives us an overwhelming view of the infinite evil and malignant nature of sin; and that blood of infinite dignity was required to discharge its claim on the sinner. “ Without shedding of blood is no remission.” It also speaks of the inflexible justice of God, the integrity of His word, and of the execution of the first sentence; “ In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” How utterly impossible for the guilty to escape the awful judgment of God if not sheltered and cleansed by the precious blood of Jesus! As the apostle says, “ How shall we escape if we neglect [not wickedly reject, but carelessly neglect] so great salvation?” Nothing but the blood of the paschal lamb sprinkled on Israel’s door-posts could save them from the sword of the destroyer. “When I see the blood, I will pass over you.” Truth was satisfied, justice was stayed, and deliverance from Pharaoh secured, by the blood-sprinkled lintels. God is holy; and as such He is against sin, and must judge it. Happy day, when the sinner sees that his own soul is lost without the safe-guard of the Savior’s precious blood. The work of grace is then in the conscience, and it will never be at rest until the doorposts of the heart arc sprinkled with the blood of the true paschal Lamb. Then he is safe forever and beyond the reach of every destroyer. He has a safe passport to the goodly land of Canaan.
On the other hand, the expression, “ justified by his blood/’ proves, as nothing else could, not only the evil of sin, but the perfect love of God toward the sinner. He spared not His own Son; while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Faith in that precious blood is complete justification and eternal life to the once guilty and condemned soul. What a mercy to know and to be able to say in view of the awful judgment of God against sin; “ It is God [yes, God Himself by virtue of Jesus’ blood] that justifieth; who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.” And faith, standing in the midst of these eternal realities, can raise the shout of victory, and send out its challenge in the face of every foe, “If God be for us, who can be against us?’’ He gave His Son to die; that is God’s love to the guilty. He accepted the work of His Son, and set the workman at his own right hand; that is God’s righteousness. It was righteousness on God’s part to accept the perfect righteousness presented to Him by the righteous One; and we, being accepted in Christ, are made the righteousness of God in Him.
Here we have a full gospel—justified by the blood of Jesus, complete deliverance through Him. Not merely that our sins are all forgiven; that would only be a negative blessing. But we have positive divine righteousness in Christ, which is our title to glory. Thus the intelligent believer can say, Now I stand in the presence of God not only without my sins, but in the absolute righteousness of God. Divine righteousness has taken the place of human sin. This is perfect love, perfect righteousness, perfect rest, perfect blessedness, and God perfectly glorified. But wrath, not love, awaits the unbelieving soul, yea, abides on him that submits not to the power of that justifying blood. Only those who believe in Jesus, trust in His precious blood to cleanse from all sin, arc delivered from the wrath to come.
Verse 10. “ For if, when tee were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.” Here the apostle pursues his subject with deepening interest and energy. The Spirit of God is leading the apostle in this verse to yet more definite reasoning and more powerful conclusions. Had God discovered any symptoms of love in us to servo Him, or any willingness to obey Him, His love would not have been absolutely perfect, He would have found a motive in us for His love. But how did matters stand? We were ungodly, without strength, sinners, enemies; so that the positive enmity of man, as shown in these four features, but furnished the deepest occasion for the display of His all-perfect love.
From the garden of Eden to the cross of Calvary, in place of man showing any symptoms of love or of obedience, he takes no pleasure in the things of God, sees no beauty, no loveliness, in His holiness, no glory in His righteousness, and dares to insult His majesty. His judgments, though a law-breaker, he disregards; His mercies, though he would perish were they to be withdrawn, He despises; His temporal favors, he uses, or, it may be, abuses, to His dishonor; His love, in the coming of His Christ, he rejected; the testimony of the Holy Spirit to the work of Christ and the salvation which is in Him unto eternal glory, he refuses as less worthy of his thoughts than the fleeting vanities of a day. Can any reason be found in man why God should love him? Rather, is there not every reason why God should be against him? To love such, must be free, perfect, sovereign, love. The reason, the motive, the power, is in Himself. It is God’s own love; lie only can love like this; and, forever be adored His great and holy name, He has loved us, He docs love us with an everlasting love, and with loving kindness has He drawn us to Himself, and blessed us in His love.
Divine Love and Its Fruits
But even that love could not have sufficed of itself to meet our case as enemies. God’s love was indeed great, but His wrath was just. The death and resurrection of Christ were necessary to put everything in its right place: neither wrath, on God’s part, against sin, nor enmity on man’s against God, is ignored. The daysman not only lays his hand on the alien sinner, but on the God of holiness. He is the Mediator, and reconciliation is accomplished. The ministry of this reconciliation was given to our apostle.
In 2 Cor. 5 we have this immense truth, that God was in Christ. In His character of Reconciler He thus in richest grace draws nigh to us, because, as sinners and without strength, we could not go to Him; God was in Christ; that is to say, when Christ was on earth He was “ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them.” Thus we learn that it is God who reconciles, and that man, the believer, is reconciled through the death of Christ. “ For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” All is based upon this truth of unspeakable importance.
God had set His love upon us where we were, and as we were, and in order to make us the expression of His own divine righteousness through all eternity, He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us. Oh, most marvelous truth! Immeasurable grace! Infinite goodness! Man had no righteousness of his own, he had been weighed in the balances, and found wanting; he had been tested by the truth of God, and found to be only sin. But in place of executing the judgment due on the poor blinded slave of sin and Satan, He so wrought for Him in Christ, as to bring him back, and give him a place of nearness to Himself, according to His own nature and purpose, by redemption. Jesus died, His blood was shed, the believer is justified, reconciled, and made the righteousness of God in Christ. As the sin-bearer, He perfectly glorified God, blotted out sin, finished redemption, accomplished righteousness, and thus laid a foundation for the fullest and highest results of the purposes of His love. Throughout the countless ages of eternity, and before the myriad hosts of principalities and powers, in heavenly places, this mighty miracle of grace shall be displayed, and as children we shall be the objects of His complacent delight forever and forever.
The apostle now fairly reasons, that if, while we were enemies, Christ died for us, what will He not do for us now that we are His friends; and also, He who died for us being alive, and having all power in heaven and on earth, acts for us in the mighty energy in which He lives eternally? “ Much more shall we be saved by his life.” “Fear not,” He said to John in resurrection, “lam the first and the last; I am he that liveth and was dead; and behold I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” There was nothing now to make John afraid. Christ had put away his sins on the cross, He had vanquished death and the grave, and He held in His hand the symbols of absolute authority over Satan and the realm of darkness. Every foe was now beneath His feet, and the Christian being in the risen Christ, and one with Him, every foe is beneath his feet, while he stands fast in his risen and victorious Lord. His life in resurrection is the pledge and security for the eternal life of all who believe in Him, as He Himself says, “ Because I live, ye shall live also.” John 14:9; Rev. 1:17, 18.
Such are the blessed fruits of divine love—of the gospel of God. The believer is not only pardoned, justified, and reconciled, but he is associated with Christ as risen from among the dead; possessed of the same life, indwelt by the same Holy Spirit, standing in the same relationship to God the Father, blessed with the same inheritance, an heir of God, and a joint-heir with Christ. Nor is this rich roll of blessing all the fruit of that love, even that which may be enjoyed here on our pilgrim way. The apostle boasts of a yet higher privilege.
THE CHRISTIAN’S HIGHEST JOY.
Verse 11. “ And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement”—reconciliation (see margin). Higher joy than this we can never have; it is infinite, yet we have already entered into it. We joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ—in virtue of completed reconciliation, a blessed, conscious, happy re-union with the living God is accomplished. This verse brings us back to the beginning of our chapter, where it is said that believers have peace with God, have access to Him, and rejoice in hope of His glory. But here we have arrived at the fountain head, looking through all the blessings conferred on us, and rejoicing in God Himself as the highest spring and object of them all. Yes! God Himself is the Christian’s joy, glory, and boast! It is not now merely in hope of the glory of God that we rejoice; nor is it in our tribulation, because of its effects, divine love being known in our hearts through the Holy Ghost given unto us; nor is it in the many blessings He has given us, but, better far, in Himself.
This is grace, pure grace, grace to the poorest, grace to the vilest, grace to thee, my reader, if thou wilt only have it in God’s way. Man’s ability to meet the requirements of the holiness of God has been fully tried, but the plainer the truth, the clearer the light, the more did it bring out man’s darkness and opposition to God. And then grace came in—it was God’s due time—and Christ died for the ungodly. We can only be pardoned and saved through faith in the blood of Jesus. When God sees the blood of the slain Lamb, He is satisfied. He sees that which has blotted out sin, vindicated His character, verified His word, and met the whole need of ruined man. And now, observe, if thou art satisfied with it, trusting wholly to it, as the only answer to sin’s claims upon thy precious soul—the only discharge from that dread tribunal; thy soul is saved, and God is glorified.
There is nothing we are so slow to understand as grace; nothing so hard for our hearts as to be humble enough to see that grace only can meet our case, and nothing so easy as to get away from this lowly place. The natural feeling of the human heart is, not that there is grace in God for the sinner, but, “ I know that thou art an austere man.” So it was with the prodigal son—with every prodigal son and daughter: the thought of grace in his father’s heart never once entered into his mind, and therefore he reckoned on being received as an “ hired servant.” Bat how was he met? on the ground of righteousness or of grace? Had it been the former, he would have been condemned to the judgment due to his sins; but, as in the case of every penitent sinner, it was on the ground of pure, rich, free grace. Not a word was said to him as to where he had been, or what he had done, he was sheltered by the blood of Jesus. The Father knew every moment of his past history, but every offense was met, and all his sins cleansed away by the blood of Jesus Christ, God’s own Son. Faith, through grace, had triumphed in the prodigal’s return, and now grace shines in his acceptance. “ Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet; and bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat and be merry: for this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.” All is grace, pure grace.
THE SINNER’S LOWEST CONDITION.
The former condition of those who are now rejoicing in God is set forth, as above, in the very strongest language. And this, no doubt, that divine love might be manifested in the fullest way to the chief of sinners; and that such may be encouraged to believe in God through our Lord Jesus Christ. But supposing for a moment that my reader is still unconverted, and that I ask him the following questions:—Can you believe that there is love in God’s heart towards you, notwithstanding all you have done, been, and still are? Do you believe that you may come to Him, believing in Christ, just as you are, and just at this moment, without any preparation on your own part? And do you believe that you will be received with open arms, embraced with the kiss of peace; sealed with the ring of eternal love; clothed with the best robe, the righteousness of God; and introduced to the Father’s house, all heaven rejoicing, as your home forever? Or, as in the case of the fallen woman at the feet of Jesus, in the house of Simon; do you believe that grace will meet you as fully as it met her? “ And he said unto her, Thy sins are forgiven; thy faith hath saved thee; go in peace.” And do you further believe that it is the death of Jesus that has opened the way for the love of God to flow forth in such streams of blessing? The heart that can amen these questions is surely taught of God, and savingly acquainted with His grace; I mean the heart that has felt their importance, and answers seriously, not lightly.
But no supposed case can exceed the alienation of heart from God which the description before us gives; and yet it was for such that Jesus died, not only to prove God’s love, but to open the flood-gates, that it might find a righteous channel in which to flow forth to the utmost bounds of human need. They were without strength, ungodly, sinners, under wrath, enemies of God. If such, then, is man’s condition by nature, the love of God toward us must be absolutely free from all motive, in us or of us. Hence, not only its perfectness, but its unchangeableness. It flows, not from promises made to us, but purely from what God is; and “ God is love.” The spring being in the depths of His heart who knows no change, all the blessings of that love are absolutely secured to the feeblest believer in Christ Jesus. Nothing in us called it out, nothing in us can drive it back; unless, indeed, it may be for a time, through our ingratitude and love of the world. Such was the painful experience of the blessed Lord when here amongst men. For His love He had hatred; for His goodness He had ingratitude; for His faithfulness He had a cross. “ This, for He was perfect love, was, I doubt not, the sense of what was expressed by Jesus in the words, ‘1 have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!’ The love was there, full, perfect, active in His heart. He showed it in all that He did, in all that it could be shown in, but as to the proper effect of its power, its true object, the reconciling man to Himself, it was, so to speak, driven back into Himself: blessed be God! unweakened, but driven back, finding no response in man’s heart, nothing to which it could attach itself there, in the selfish enmity which reigned there.”
Divine Love and Its Fruits
Christ the only channel of blessing to man.
If the heart of God is the native fountain of redeeming love, Christ is its only channel, as the Holy Ghost is its only power. We joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ. For our joy in God—which is the highest that can ever be attained or enjoyed even throughout eternity—with all the unspeakable blessings enumerated from the first to the eleventh verse, we are debtors to Jesus. Oh, how this should bind our hearts to Him in unreserved, undivided devotedness! Oh! what can I do for Him who has done so much for me? should be the natural cry of every saved soul.
How dreadful the thought that we can forget our Savior and Lord; that we can object to do His will; that we can leave His presence, and do our own; that we can shut Him out, and entertain His enemies; that we can take the most serious and important step in life in direct opposition to His revealed word. Nevertheless He loves on, loves on. What a mercy, His love, though slighted, is not weakened, is not turned away from us! He knew from the beginning what we would be. At the same time we must not forget that He is our Lord as well as our Savior, and that He will take His own time and way to bring us back, but that may be with a humiliation that will cleave to us through life.
May the Lord enable every believer who reads these pages to realize his position as one with Christ in resurrection. There could be no link between a sinless Christ and sinful flesh; but there is a real union between the Christian and the risen Christ. In a new life, by the Holy Ghost, he is united to Him who is in the presence of God for us; and we are in Him, and as He is in heavenly places. Christ’s death writes death on the old man; all are dead. “ If one died for all, then were all dead.” Obviously the moral history of man closes here. But the believer has the privilege of knowing that he not only died in Christ’s death, but that he rose again in His resurrection. “ Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed. And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.” Rom. 6:6; Gal. 5:24.
This is the true and only principle of christian life and christian position; dead to the world, and alive unto God in Christ. And being thus united to Christ in heaven, this life must be one with Him, and its true character will be displayed by living to Him before men. Seeing, then, that this is the Christian’s position, can he have one single principle in common with the world? Not one. He is one with Christ, and as He is before God, therefore he ought to be the living display of what Christ is here in this world before men. “I am crucified with Christ,” said Paul; “nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” Gal. 2:20.
Here we may close our papers on the history of the first and the Second man. God has been fully revealed. Where? In Christ; in His life, and in His death. He was a true witness for God in grace. He might wither the self-righteous Pharisee with His rebuke, who was only adding the sin of hypocrisy to his other sins; but to the penitent at His feet He was all grace, nothing but grace and love. God’s righteous wrath against sin was fully expressed on the cross; there the believer sees the burning wrath of God against his sin spent on the holy Sufferer; so that the judgment of God against sin, which we naturally fear and dread, has become our salvation. He put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. The Savior died, having borne the judgment, is risen again, and stands in living righteousness before God. The first man had no righteousness for God, but Christ is of God, made righteousness unto all who believe.
the reign of grace.
This is the new order of things, and the summing up of the great principles and ways of God’s dealings with man through Christ, the last Adam. God is righteous, and God is gracious, therefore grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life, by Jesus Christ our Lord. Where sin abounded, grace much more abounds. Now the sinner knows what the God is with whom he has to do. What a mercy! Look, my fellow-sinner, at the reception of the prodigal son, and see what God is. And follow the footsteps of Him who is the revelation and testimony of God to man. Whenever there is reality before Him, no mere pretense to be something that is good, but true humility, a loathing of self, He takes the place of perfect grace, and lavishes the full blessings of His love on the penitent soul, without ever uttering one upbraiding word. This is God—God in Christ to every penitent sinner, though he may be the vilest of the human race—a robber, an outcast, or one who was covered with the darkest sin of woman; yet she may find a refuge in that heart—which only loves—from the cruel rage of her fellow-sinners. And another, whom the Pharisee would not have touched with his staff, draws forth, in sweetest tenderness, a plenary pardon, salvation and peace with God. His lips dropped words of grace, as sweet-smelling myrrh, in the presence of the chiefs of Israel. There divine love found its repast, not on the lordly dish of the Pharisee, but in the broken heart that lay bleeding at His feet; and she carries off the noblest prize of infinite love, while the self-righteous Pharisee, who had no appreciation for the lowly Jesus, is left to wither under the blighting curse of divine righteousness.
Learn then, Ο my fellow-sinner, from these lovely scenes how to meet God. Meet Him thou must; but how? On the ground of grace or righteousness? This meeting, remember, cannot be avoided. We must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ. Now is the time to come to Him—to come as a penitent, as that woman did—and all, all, is well. There thou seest the heart of God bowed down in loveliest grace to meet her every need. And we may be bold, yet free to say, that the heart of Jesus was never more gladdened in this world, and He will be equally gladdened to meet all thy need on the same plea—as a sinner, melted, broken down, at His feet. Grace has no respect of persons, as thou seest, but thou must come to Him by faith, There is no salvation but through faith in Him. In His death there is the full answer to thy whole condition as a man and a sinner; in resurrection He has taken His place in the power of a new life; and thus He is the Head of a new race which belong to Him by faith, righteous in Him, as we were sinners in the first Adam.
But, oh! forget not, again, I pray thee, that outside of this heaven-born race, through faith in Jesus Christ, is no salvation. All, all, is lost—lost forever, and lost within arm’s-length of the gates of heaven. Thou art bound to believe the result of thine own history, as summed up in the death of Christ; and thou art equally bound to believe that there, through His death and resurrection, a new life only is to be found. Do, then, I beseech thee, come to Jesus. He is disappointed at the slowness of man’s heart to believe. Hear His own touching complaint: “ Ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.” Better far, my friend, spend thy eternity with Jesus and all His ransomed ones, within the golden gates of everlasting glory, than be shut within the gloomy gates of hell, in the dark and murky regions of everlasting woe. It must be in the one place or the other; there is no middle place. Oh! break with the world; decide for Christ; give thy heart to Him, so shall thy blessing be great in this life, and as age after age rolls on, unfolding the ever increasing wonders of redeeming love, and the ever-deepening mysteries of that precious blood which lusters the throne of God, so shall thy blessing continue to abound throughout a glorious eternity.