June 8

But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared.—Psalms 130:4.

WHAT the apostle says of his own danger, may, properly enough, be applied to a confession of the soul, pressed under the burden of its own guilt. We had received the sentence of death in ourselves, that we might not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead. For the exclamation before us bears a remarkable resemblance to that expression, If thou, Lord, shouldst mark iniquity, O Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared. He who from justice found not any ground upon which he might stand, finds in mercy a place from which he may rise again. And this is the remedy of all our grief and distress, and in this sense we must be sick that we may recover, and must die that we may live. Grace exerts its power, where nature and art, and all the excellency and strength of human nature, fail; nor does any soul celebrate the Divine benignity more signally than those who are snatched as it were out of the flames, when they are beginning to seize them, and being rescued from the very jaws of hell, return to life again, and breathe in the land of the living.

But there is forgiveness with thee—which is added with the utmost propriety; with him there is a treasure of mercy laid up, to be imparted most freely and richly to every humble sinner that applies to him for it. Nor is the dispensing of grace in this way at all inconsistent with the richness and freeness of it, since the greatest sins, the most aggravated crimes, are absolutely forgiven, without any penalty or fine whatever imposed upon the offender, yet, on this most reasonable and happy condition, that they who are thus received into the Divine favor should express their grateful acknowledgments of it, by love, obedience, and sanctity of life. Neither is this forgiveness the less free and gracious, because Jesus Christ, as our surety and Redeemer, has paid the price of it, having been appointed for and destined to this great and arduous work by the Father. For what does that great Father of mercies herein, but, in order to our complete discharge, by one certain, and ever-to-be-admired way satisfy himself of his own, by fastening his only-begotten Son to the cross? The repository of this treasure is opened, the whole price is poured out at once, that great price of our redemption, more precious than all the treasures, than all the mines of gold in the world, or even the whole world itself.

It was fit that our wise Creator should give us a law, and that law was both useful and pleasant to those who would carefully observe it; but when once violated, there would necessarily arise a fatal enmity between the law and the transgressors of it, an enmity which would continually become progressive, and gather new strength in the progress. But as for our obstinacy, what is it more than to kick against the pricks? The law is inviolably safe in its own sanctity, dignity, and immortality; but we, by striving against it, what do we gain but iniquity, disgrace, and death? So that if there were no umpire to interpose, there would be no hope, but that the whole human kind should perish. But that blessed and efficacious Intercessor came from on high; and certainly he was himself a Divine person, who could compose such a controversy, and who joining, by an indissoluble union, his infinitely better with our miserable and mortal nature, did so, by a most wonderful method, render to the law all its accuracy of obedience, and to us, though guilty, impunity. And having thus made peace, that concord might afterward continue and prevail, he animates all who partake of this blessed peace, by his own new, pure, and Divine Spirit, that they might not only be engaged sincerely to endeavor to observe diligently the sacred precepts of the law, but might love them, and cordially embrace them. At the same time, he hath tempered the severity of the law toward all those that are received into favor, that their diligent, pious, and affectionate observance of the law, though not entirely complete, should, by our indulgent Father, be most graciously accepted, even as if it were perfect. And so the honor of the Divine Legislator is secure among men, and his peace descends upon them; and this is what our text observes, There is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared.