THE blood of Christ is the ground of our forgiveness, and the riches of God’s grace the standard. Conditional forgiveness would be law, not grace. Partial forgiveness would reflect no glory on the blood of Jesus; but full unconditional forgiveness proves God’s estimate of the blood, and shows that all blessing depends exclusively upon its value. We are forgiven, then, according to the value of the blood of Christ, and according to the riches of divine grace. We needed redemption and forgiveness, not according to our thoughts and feelings, but according to God’s thoughts and counsels, and we have them—have them now; and have both in connection with the Person of Christ. This is everything! We have redemption and forgiveness in Him. God is glorified, the riches of His grace are displayed, and our cup of blessing overflows.
Kind hearts are here, yet would the tenderest one
Have limits to its mercy — GOD has none;
And man’s forgiveness may be true and sweet,
And yet he stoops to give it: more complete
Is love that lays forgiveness at thy feet,
And pleads with thee to raise it; only heaven
Means crowned, not vanquished, when it says FORGIVEN.
But some will say, “How is it, then, that I still feel sin working in my heart, if I am so fully forgiven — so richly blessed?” True, sin still remains in the heart. But has God anywhere said that He has put away sin from the believer’s heart? I am sure He has not. What then? He put it away on the cross; He has not put it away from your heart. But just because it was put away on the cross, He has forgiven you, and all who believe in Jesus. Therefore God rests on the completed work of the cross, and that is where you should rest.
There is no other ground of rest for a guilty soul in the universe; but faith in the cross, however weak, draws down God’s deepest compassion, and the riches of His grace. But, on the other hand, all confidence, however strong, that is not founded on the cross, is without God’s approval, and must come to nothing. Be content then to know that God dealt with thy sins in the Person of thy Substitute on the cross, and put them away by the shedding of His blood. The whole question of sin, as to every believer, is settled and sealed in the blood of God’s dear Son. But, again, the uneasy soul will say, “I am sure I sin daily, and if I live till tomorrow I shall be sinning again, let me watch against it as I may. What am I to think of these sins?” Think of them, O believer, humiliating as they are, as having been judged by God in the Person of His Son on the cross. “His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree” (1 Pet. 2:2424Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. (1 Peter 2:24)). This will work in thy soul a deeper sense of His love, and of the hatefulness of sin, than anything else can. All true, honest self-judgment of sin is founded on the assurance that it was divinely judged on the cross. When thou halt no doubt that God judged and put away these very sins on the cross, then thou canst judge them in His holy presence. Self-judgment must go on as long as we are in this world, for sin will exist as long as we are here. But the divine judgment of sin was executed once and finished. “It is finished” should give perfect rest as to divine judgment of sin.
A. M.