1 remember a person saying once that he "did not like the word grace; the word love meant the same thing and was much better." This is a mistake; grace goes a great deal further than love. Man loves that which is in some way, he thinks, worthy of love, and lie thinks God is the same as himself. Therefore he says, "I must turn to God someday and try to be worthy of His love, and then He will love me.":Now the grace of God is the very opposite to this human thought. I do not know anything like it in the whole world.
"What is grace?" I asked the other day.
"Mercy" was the reply. Well, it is true the love of God and the mercy of God are both very, very wonderful. "But God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins." Both the mercy and love of God are thus in grace, that is, in pure unmerited favor Yet this grace of God goes further, yes, far beyond the reach of all human thought.
Let us suppose that a criminal, guilty of such crimes as to make him an object of the deepest abhorrence, stands condemned before the judge. Merry would be a great thing shown to such a one, but if it were possible in the heart of a human judge to love such a one, so utterly worthless and undeserving, that would indeed be a wonder. But what would be thought if the judge so loved the poor, guilty one as to put himself really in the place of the prisoner. He bears the full penalty of all his crimes and then takes him into his own house and makes him a partner with himself, saying, "As long as I live, all that I have is yours." Ah! tell me where among the cold hearted sons of men was ever grace shown like this? No, the glory of this grace belongs alone to my God. Oh, how shall I tell of His wondrous grace!
You may have heard of it by the hearing of the ear, but has this grace ever reached your heart by the power of the Spirit of God? Has your heart been stirred that God should thus love and pity and show mercy to the guilty? Yes, God sent His own dear Son in sweetest grace to take the place of the lost and guilty and in purest grace to bear all their sins in His own body on the tree! Oh, look at the cross! God in grace met man's utmost need. Do you in your very heart believe it? Then you may cast yourself before such a God, confessing all your sins, your wretchedness, your misery and spread it all before Him. He will pardon the confessing sinner in faithfulness to the blood of Jesus. Jesus died for that purpose that God might be just, not only in pardoning, but in justifying every sinner that believes.
This is not all: God in pure grace takes the utterly unworthy sinner, now pardoned and justified, into perfect partnership and oneness with Himself in the ever-blessed Lord Jesus. In this grace He met the murderer Saul, and from that moment Paul became a partner or joint-heir with Christ. What a change! From that day he could say, "Not I, but Christ liveth in me." Right well did he know that nothing could separate him from such love as this.
Yes, God in the wonders of His grace can meet a murderer, a drunkard, a harlot, or, worse than all; a deceived and self-righteous Pharisee. Yes, from this moment the days of your partnership with Satan may be ended. Oh, may God grant it! May this be your happy portion: pardoned, justified and forever one with Christ. This was grace, not only to take the sinner's place, but to give the guilty one an everlasting place with Himself in resurrection glory. This salvation is wholly of God. C. Stanley