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I. IT IS AN UNSPEAKABLE MERCY TO HAVE OUR SINS FORGIVEN. This is the first desire and prayer of an awakened sinner, and a principal blessing in the covenant of grace.

II. IT IS THE SOLE PREROGATIVE OF GOD TO FORGIVE SIN. None can pass by an offence but the party offended, and none can discharge a debt but the person with whom it was contracted.

III. THOSE TO WHOM GOD FORGIVES SIN HAVE NOTHING TO PAY. The whole creation is become insolvent.

IV. THOSE WHOSE SINS ARE PARDONED ARE FIRST BROUGHT TO SEE THAT THEY HAVE NOTHING TO PAY.

V. THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS IS ALL OF GRACE.

VI. THE FORGIVENESS OF SIN TENDS TO GLORIFY GOD. Hence we may learn —

1. How much those wrong God who entertain hard thoughts of Him.

2. What gratitude and love is due to Him from those whose sins are pardoned!

(B. Beddome, M. A.)From the whole, we may observe these six things.

1. That sinners are in debt to God, as having violated His law, and so laid themselves open to the punishment threatened: "The wages of sin is death."

2. Some have contracted greater guilt, and so are more in debt to God than others, as having laid themselves open to greater punishment; from the greater advantages they have enjoyed and abused, they have more to answer for and more to fear.

3. It is the common condition of sinners indebted to God that they have nothing to pay, nothing to satisfy Divine justice, or redeem themselves from deserved wrath.

4. God is able and ready to forgive the greatest debt and debtors, as well as the least; those that owe five hundred pence, as well as those that owe fifty.

5. Whom God forgives, He forgives freely; not excluding the satisfaction of Christ, but upon the account of it, which is so far from lessening the freeness of that grace that forgives us, that it greatly exalts it.

I. SOME WHO HAVE RUN FAR IN DEBT TO GOD HAVE BEEN FORGIVEN. Manasseh in the Old Testament, and Paul and Mary Magdalene.

1. Thus He magnifies His patience, and proves it Divine, the patience of God, and not of a creature, much less of a man. (1 Timothy 1:16.)

2. Some whose iniquities have abounded have been forgiven, for the greater exaltation of grace. Grace is thus exalted and glorified —

(1) In its fulness; that so where sin hath abounded grace may much more abound.

(2) Herein grace shines in its freeness: which, that it may be regarded, it is God's method, before He makes the offer of pardon, to sum up what sinners have been and done (Isaiah 43:22-24).

II. WHAT THERE IS IN FORGIVING GRACE TO BE AN ARGUMENT FOR LOVE IN THOSE THAT RECEIVE IT. If blessedness be an argument for love, forgiveness has this belonging to it, and connected with it (Psalm 32:1, 2). This is a comprehensive blessing, and the foundation of many others. They who have their sins forgiven, are freed from the greatest evil, the wrath of God, and eternal condemnation. Pardon of sin is a covenant-mercy, always connected with the favour of God, and a special relation to to Him. The pardon of sin will sweeten every other mercy, and render any outward burden or affliction tolerable. Sin imbitters, and adds a weight to any affliction; but pardon doth lighten and sweeten it. In a word, the sinner, pardoned in this world, shall have eternal life in the future.

III. How GOD'S GRACE, AS FREELY FORGIVING GREATER DEBTS, SHOULD LEAD THE FORGIVEN SOUL TO LOVE HIM THE MORE.And here God's rich grace, freely forgiving greater debts —

1. Tends to this, as it frees the soul from greater torment, to which its multiplied sins laid it open, especially those committed against light and grace.

2. God's mercy, as forgiving greater debts, may free the soul from the more tormentful apprehensions it is under, even here, of the wrath to come, and so engage Him to love the more.

3. The greater and more astonishing grace abounding towards great sinners, and singling them out for mercy when others are left, is another ground of greater love.

Application:

1. Have such as have run deeply in debt to God been freely forgiven by Him? What reason have we, then, to believe Him when He declares Himself thus, "As I live, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live"!

2. How unreasonable are the hard and horrid thoughts whereby sinners, awakened to a sense of their vileness and guilt, are kept off from a forgiving God?

3. How disingenuous would it be for any to go on with the greater security and boldness in sin, because God is ready so freely to forgive the greatest debt?

4. For the greatest sinners to say, There is no hope in their case, is to say what they have no warrant for, from God or His Word.

5. Let such as have any good hope that their debts, how large soever, are forgiven, love much, yea, love the more, the larger their debts have been. If we are pardoned at all, it is a very great debt from which we are discharged. O let us labour after suitable affection, and show it.

(1) By reflecting upon sin with the greater shame and sorrow, hatred and abhorrence, as committed against so good a God.

(2) Having much forgiven, love God the more, and give Him the glory due unto His name. "Who is a God like unto Thee, who pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by transgression," &c.

(3) Having much forgiven, let your love show itself greater by your growing esteem of Jesus Christ, whose blood was the price of your pardon, and though it is given you freely, cost Him His life.

(D. Wilcox.)

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KJV: There was a certain creditor which had two debtors: the one owed five hundred pence, and the other fifty.

WEB: "A certain lender had two debtors. The one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.