Isaiah 38:17-19 Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: but you have in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption… I. A SENSE OF PARDON AS GIVEN BY GOD TO THE SINNER. 1. We are not to wait for this sense of pardon before we come to Christ. 2. This consciousness of pardon includes many things, although it is not alike comprehensive in all souls. 3. But, saith one, "How does this sense of pardon come?" It comes in different ways and forms. Many men receive their consciousness of pardon in an instant. With others it is of slower growth. This conviction is sometimes conveyed to us in the most extraordinary manner. I have known it brought home to the soul by some singular saying of a minister. At other times, some strange providence has been the singular means of giving joy and relief. 4. Permit me to dwell upon the joy which this sense of pardon creates. It is but taking God at His word, when the soul knows that as a necessary consequence of its faith it is saved. But, besides that, the Spirit beareth witness with our spirit, that we are born of God. II. A SENSE OF FORGIVENESS ENJOYED BY MAN, NOT AS A SINNER, BUT AS A PARDONED CHILD. I have sometimes heard uninstructed Christians ask how it is that when a man is once pardoned he has nevertheless to ask every day that his sins may be forgiven. The difficulty lies in a forgetfulness of the relationship which Christians sustain to God. As a sinner I come to Christ and trust Him. God is then a Judge; He takes the great book of the court, strikes out my sins, and acquits me. At the same moment, out of His great love, He adopts me into His family. Now I stand in quite a different relationship to Him. I am not so much His subject as His child. He is no longer to me a Judge, but has become a Father. And now I have new laws, a new discipline, new treatment; now I have new obedience. I go and do wrong. What then? Does the Judge come and at once summon me before His throne? No! He is a Father, and that Father brings me up before His face, and frowns on me — nay, takes the rod and begins to scourge me. He never scourged me when He was a Judge. Then, He only threatened to use the axe. If I do that which is wrong, I am bound to go to Him as on a child's knees, and say, "Our Father which art in heaven, forgive me these trespasses, as I forgive them that trespass against me." ( C. H. Spurgeon.) Parallel Verses KJV: Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: but thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption: for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back. |
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