HOPE FOR THE PENITENT
Isaiah 43:24-26. Thou hast made me to serve with thy sins, &c.
These words are addressed to penitent sinners, mourning before God on account of their transgressions. I joy to bring to them this message of mercy and peace. Listen, then, O mourners in Zion,
I. TO A DECLARATION OF YOUR SINS AND DESERTS.
With what a heavy charge does my text begin! Yet, you know it is true. Not only sinners by nature, you have grieved and wearied God by your actual transgressions. What evil tempers, words, actions, sins of omission and of commission, you have to confess before God! How often did you offend Him even in His sanctuary! The charges His word brought against you, you met by unbelief, itself the sin of sins; but now you feel that you are indeed guilty before God. But let not a sight and sense of your guilt discourage your souls; but let it make Christ and His salvation the more welcome. Listen,
II. TO THE PROCLAMATION OF A FREE AND FULL FORGIVENESS (Isaiah 43:25).
There is nothing but encouragement in these gracious words; they abound with blessings; they make known
“Mercy for all, immense and free.”
The Promiser, the promise itself, its kind application, and the basis on which it rests, open to us four sources of the most abundant joy and consolation.
1. The Author of the promise. “I am He that blotteth out thy transgressions.” Mourning sinners, do you know that voice? It is the voice of the Lord (Exodus 34:6-7). He does not commission a multitude of the heavenly host to carry glad tidings of great joy to all who mourn over their trangressions; neither does He merely command the minister of His word to speak comfortably unto them: but from His lofty throne He Himself speaks unto their hearts!
2. Hence the promise in the text is expressed in the most cheering language (Isaiah 43:25). It is not uncommon for the Scriptures to represent sins as debts, an account of which is preserved in the book of the creditor. When the debt is paid, the sum is crossed over, to intimate that the creditor’s demands are satisfied, and that the debtor is known in that character no longer. But here, to point out the free and full manner in which God bestows pardon, the significant expression “blotteth out” is used, the debt is not merely crossed but obliterated; so that the record can be read no more. God forgives large debts as well as small (Luke 7:40-42). Nor will He make any demand of thy debt at any future time; He will remember thy sins no more.
3. His promise applies to the man who feels most that he deserves no mercy from God. Thou mourner in Zion, thy self-despair makes it evident that “thou art not far from the kingdom of God.” No longer despair; “be not faithless, but believing” (H. E. I. 2332–2337).
4. The basis on which this promise rests may further assure us of the certainty of its fulfilment. God forgives the guilty for His own sake, and not for the sake of their deservings (Isaiah 43:25; Isaiah 48:9-11; Ezekiel 36:22; Ezekiel 36:25-26; Ezekiel 36:31-32). God pardons the believing penitent—
(1) For His mercy’s sake. It is the property of the eternal Jehovah “always to have mercy,” but every act of free unmerited grace in justifying the ungodly furnishes a new display of His glory. God is concerned for His own honour; He, therefore, will save all who come to Him through His Son Jesus Christ. Will God, “who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, that with Him He might freely give us all things,” withhold from thee that pardon which, at His feet, thou art groaning to obtain? If thou wert to perish while coming to God in the way He Himself hath appointed, what a triumph it would afford to all the powers of darkness!
(2) For His justice’s sake (Romans 3:23-26). On the ground of the all-sufficient atonement of our Lord Jesus Christ, it is for the honour of the justice of God to pardon the guilty the moment he confesses his sins, and truly believes upon the righteous Saviour.
(3) For His truth’s sake (Ezekiel 33:11; Isaiah 55:7). God will as certainly perform all His promises as His threatenings.
As the promise rests on a foundation that cannot be shaken, we ought with confidence and joy to receive it.
III. TO THE INVITATION URGING YOU TO ACCEPT THE PROFFERED MERCY (Isaiah 43:26).
These glorious words invite all the contrite in heart into the very presence of God, there to prefer their requests, assured that He will “fulfil all their petitions.” In pressing these petitions they have a threefold duty to perform:—
1. To state the grounds on which they expect an answer: “Put Me in remembrance.” Thus He speaks in compassion to our infirmities, and to encourage us to “come with boldness to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy.” Put Him in remembrance—
(1) Of Gethsemane and the cross.
(2) Of His promises. The best prayers penitent sinners can use are the promises of God turned into petitions.
(3) Of His wonted compassion to sinners.
2. To urge in humble confidence their requests: “Let us plead together.” (Cf. Job 23:1-7.) Let the pleading begin on your part; and let this be your encouragment, that the Holy Spirit “will help your infirmities.” All your arguments must be such as proceed from a full and unqualified admission of your own guilt, a ready acknowledgment of past sinfulness, of your present unworthiness, and of your utter helplessness. Confession of sin is one of the most powerful pleas you can use! But, saith the Redeemer, “Let us plead together.” Listen, therefore, to His pleadings with you. Renouncing your own righteousness, you plead His merits; He also pleads those merits as a reason why you should no longer doubt, but take Him as the Lord in whom you have righteousness and strength. He will remind you of His promises; and if there be any upbraiding at all on His part, it will be nothing more than is contained in these Scriptures (John 16:24; John 20:27).
3. To claim in strong faith the promised blessing: “Declare thou, that thou mayest be justified.” Nothing is wanting to pardon, but their own declaration! “What must I declare?” Declare with all thine heart, “I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. I believe that He is my Saviour, my Lord, and my God. I take Him for my wisdom, my righteousness, my sanctification, my redemption.”
“Lord, I believe Thy precious blood,
Which at the mercy-seat of God
For ever doth for sinners plead,
For me, even for my soul, was shed.”
—W. J. Shrewsbury: Sermons, pp. 370–400.
FORGIVENESS OF SIN
Isaiah 43:25. I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions, for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.
“THY SINS.” What is sin? We must go the Word of God for a correct reply; for although at first the divine law was written on the human heart, yet now depravity has well nigh effaced that writing, and sin itself has made the conscience vile. Neither can we truly learn what sin is by comparing ourselves with our fellow-men, for they are sinners as we are. In God’s Word alone can we clearly perceive what sin is, as being in its essence a violation of law, and contempt of the divine Lawgiver (H. E. I. 4478–4480). But even in this aspect its full enormity does not come into view. We must consider what God is, and what we owe to Him, and then it will appear that our iniquity is the forthputting of our strength against Him from whom our strength has been derived, and to whom we owe our all.
Observe, our iniquities are here called ours. “Thy sins,” “thy transgressions.” We often boast of our possessions, but there is nothing else ours as sin is ours. In the sense of absolute possession, sins are the only things we have. We are their authors, their creators; and if we repent not, throughout eternity they will be vultures which will gnaw our hearts, the undying worm, and the unquenchable fire to which we shall be constantly exposed.
Can no one sever the connection between me and my sin? Must I perish thus? The text is God’s gracious answer to that anxious question.
I. THE BLESSING HERE PROMISED.
1. Forgiveness. “I am He that blotteth out thy transgressions.” The language is figurative, and may refer either to the blotting out of a dark cloud from the heavens, until thereshall not be a single speck upon the blue expanse; or to the blotting out of a sentence, when the criminal is pardoned. Forgiveness is the setting free of a guilty man from liability to the punishment which his crimes have merited. Of this pardon two characteristics are prominent in the phraseology of the text.
(1.) Its fulness. It is a blotting out. He redeems Israel from all his iniquities.
(2.) It is a present blessing. The words imply that God does so even now. Soon as the sinner believes, he is forgiven.
2. “I will not remember thy sins.” In a strict sense I am not sure that God can be said to remember or to forget anything. The expression of my text must not be taken in its strictest literality; it is used in accommodation to our finite minds, as the best means of telling us that our former sins will not, after we are pardoned, be any, even the slightest barrier, on God’s side at least, to our intercourse with Him. They are as good as forgotten; we may therefore rise to friendship with God, undimmed by anything which, coming from Him, could painfully remind us that we had formerly been His enemies.
II. THE SOURCE FROM WHICH THIS BLESSING FLOWS.
“I, even I,” &c. It is thus a pardon from God. “Who can forgive sins but God only?” There can be no peace enjoyed by any one until he knows that it is God who has forgiven him. When a criminal has been condemned to death, the fact that he is pitied and forgiven by the friends of him whom he has murdered will not save his life, for he has sinned not merely against them, but against the law, and if the sovereign do not issue pardon, he must endure the penalty. And so I have sinned against God; and I can rest in nothing short of absolution pronounced by Him. If it be a merely human pardon on which I rest, the first thought of God will be sufficient to bring back my disquietude and fear; but if it be God’s forgiveness, I may rest on that for ever. If I certainly know that He has justified, I may sound out the daring defiance, and challenge the universe for a reply, “Who is he that condemneth?” If man pardon, God may still condemn; but if God forgive, then there is no power that can reverse His deed, and He Himself will never revoke it.
III. THE GROUND ON WHICH THIS BLESSING IS BESTOWED.
“For mine own sake.” The words imply,
1. That God does not forgive sin on the ground of anything in the sinner, or done by him. It is not written, for thy tears’ sake, or for thy good deeds’ sake, or for thy repentance’ sake, but “for mine own sake.” When the tribes of Israel were about to enter Canaan, it was over and over again declared that God gave them not that good land to possess it for their own sake, &c. (Deuteronomy 9:4-6). So with the blessings of the new covenant, “Not for your sakes do I this, saith the Lord” (Ezekiel 36:32). God will not, because He cannot, forgive you on the ground of your own worthiness, or for your own sake.
2. That God forgives sin only on such a ground as glorifies Himself. He cannot forgive sin in every way, or on every ground. He cannot do it simply for His mercy’s sake, for He is just as well as merciful; and both of these attributes must be radiant with glory, in His method of forgiveness. Hence it is only “for His own sake”—that is, through the atonement of our Lord Jesus Christ—that this blessing is bestowed: for only thus is the whole glory secured to Himself. If God were to forgive sin without any satisfaction to His justice, or any vindication of His law, His doing so would dishonour His character, and sap the foundations of His moral government. He must be seen to be a “just God” as well as “a Saviour:” and in the very matter of justifying the ungodly, His justice must be clearly manifested (H. E. I. 376).
“In that salvation wrought by Thee,
Thy glory is made great.”
For here His justice is satisfied, His law magnified, His name honoured.
IV. THE EVIDENT DELIGHT WHICH GOD HAS IN GRANTING THIS BLESSING.
“I, even I, am He.” He dwells on it, and specially on the fact of its coming from Him, to show that it is not only His own proper prerogative, but His especial delight, to forgive sin for His own sake. He delighteth in mercy, and the depth of that delight is nowhere seen so clearly as in the Cross through which He seeks to enjoy it. He is not the austere Master that many picture Him to be: He is a loving Father, if men would only let Him love them; and there is nothing now in which He so rejoices as in the bestowment of forgiveness on His believing people. Some of us can tell how blessed it is to receive this pardon; but who can conceive how much greater is the blessedness of Him who gives it! (H. E. I. 2328.) Sinner, the highest happiness thou canst give to God will be by accepting this gracious blessing.
V. THE CHARACTER OF THOSE TO WHOM THIS DECLARATION IS HERE MADE.
Read Isaiah 43:22-24. After this, as an old commentator has said, “one would think it should follow—I, even I, am He that will destroy thee, and burden myself no longer with care about thee:” but no; where sin has abounded, grace does much more abound; where wrath is most deserved, mercy is most graciously expressed. If forgiveness has been offered to sinners such as these, who had wearied God with their iniquities, is there any reason why it should not be to us? We may have been very aggravated transgressors, but we can hardly be worse than they were. Yet even if we are, we may take these words as addressed to us. It makes no matter who or what we are, yet with the Lord there is mercy for us, and with Him there is plenteous redemption.
But how, you say, am I to take it? I answer in the words of the prophet, “Let the wicked forsake His way,” &c. You are to take it by repentance and faith. Repentance looses your hold from sin, faith fixes it upon Jesus Christ.—W. M. Taylor, D.D.: “Life Truths,” pp. 21–37.
That article in the creed, “I believe in the forgiveness of sin,” is too little thought of. Men flippantly declare that they believe in it when they are not conscious of any great sin of their own, but when his transgression is made apparent to a man, and his iniquity comes home to him, it is quite another matter. His first instinct is to fear that his sins are altogether unpardonable. If he does not state his unbelief in so many words, yet in the secret of his soul that dreadful conviction takes hold upon him and darkens every window of hope. He looks to the law of God, and while he looks in that direction he will certainly conclude that there is no pardon, for the law knows nothing of forgiveness. Within the awakened man there is the memory of his past offences, and on account of these his conscience passes judgment upon his soul, and condemns it as even the law doth. Many natural impressions and instincts assist and increase the clamours of conscience; for the man knows within himself, as the result of observation and experience, that sin must bring its own punishment. He perceives that it is a knife which cuts the hand of him that handles it, a sword that kills the man who fights therewith. He feels that he cannot himself readily pass by offences committed by his fellow-men, and so he concludes that the Lord cannot willingly forgive. That part of the hardness of his heart goes to deepen the conviction that God will not pass by his transgression; and he is therefore terribly dismayed and hopeless of mercy. The convinced sinner is able to believe that mercy may be shown to others; but as for himself he signs his own death-warrant, and labours under the full persuasion that the acts of God’s mercy can never extend to him. No stocks can hold a man so fast as his own guilty fears.
With the desponding I shall try to deal.
I. THERE IS FORGIVENESS.
1. This appears in the treatment of sinners by God, inasmuch as He spares their forfeited lives. When our first parents had transgressed, they came at once under desert of penalty. The Lord visited the garden and convinced the offenders of their transgression; but instead of there and then casting them for ever away, He talked to them of a certain seed of the woman that should bruise the serpent’s head. Would the Lord thus have spared them, if He had not meant to show mercy? If God had no pardons, would He not long ago have cut us down? God waiteth long, because He willeth not the death of any, but that they turn to Him and live.
2. Why did God institute the ceremonial law, if there were no ways of pardoning transgression? Why the sacrificial shedding of blood, if God did not intend to blot out sin? Does not a type imply the existence of that which is typified? The evident design of the whole Mosaic economy was to reveal to man the existence of mercy in the heart of God, and the effectual operation of that mercy in washing away sin.
3. If there is no forgiveness of sin, why has the Lord given to sinful men exhortations to repent?
4. There must be pardons in the hand of God, or why the institution of religious worship among us to this day? Why are we allowed to pray, if we cannot be forgiven? Why are we allowed to sing the praises of God? Does God expect the condemned to praise Him? Will He shut us up in the prison-house for certain death, and yet expect us to chant hallelujahs to His praise?
5. Why did Christ institute the Christian ministry, and send forth His servants to proclaim His gospel? What is the gospel but a declaration that Christ is exalted on high to give repentance unto Israel and remission of sins? Why are we so earnestly commanded to preach this gospel to every creature, if the creature hearing it and believing it must, nevertheless, still lie under his sin?
6. Why are we taught in that blessed model of prayer which our Saviour has left us, to say, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us”? It is evident that God means us to give a true absolution to all who have offended us. He does not intend that we should play at forgiveness, but should really forgive all those who have done evil towards us in any way. Yes; but then He has linked with that forgiveness our prayer for mercy, teaching us to ask that He would forgive us as we forgive them. If, then, our forgiveness is real, so is His. A star of hope shines upon the sinner from the Lord’s Prayer in that particular petition.
7. God has actually forgiven multitudes of sinners. We have read in Holy Scripture of men who walked with God and had this testimony, that they pleased God; but they could not have pleased Him if their sins still provoked Him to wrath; therefore He must have put their sins away. But I need not talk of past ages; many sitting among you this day will tell you that they enjoy a clear sense of forgiven sin.
II. THIS FORGIVENESS IS TANTAMOUNT TO FORGETTING SIN.
The Lord does not exercise memory as you and I do. We recall the past, but He has no past; all things are present with Him. God sees everything at once by an intuitive perception: the past, the present, the future are before Him at a glance. We may not speak, except after the manner of men, of the Lord God as having memory; and yet how blessed it is that He should Himself use the speech which is current among ourselves, and represent Himself after the manner of a man, and then say, “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more for ever.” He wishes us to know that His pardon is so true and deep that it amounts to an absolute oblivion, a total forgetting of all the wrongdoing of the pardoned ones.
You know what we do when we exercise memory.
1. To speak popularly, a man lays up a thing in his mind; but when sin is forgiven it is not laid up in God’s mind. We make a kind of store-room of our memory, and there things are preserved, like fruits in autumn, stored up to be used by and by (Luke 2:19). The Lord will not do this with our sins. He will not store them in His archives; He will not give them house-room. As for the ungodly, their sins are written with an iron pen, and the measure of their iniquity is daily filling, till it be poured out upon their own head; their sins have gone before them to the judgment-seat, and are crying aloud for vengeance. As for God’s people, their case is otherwise; the Lord imputeth not their iniquities to them, and does not treasure them up against a day of wrath. Of course the Lord remembers their evil-doings in the sense that He cannot forget anything; but judicially, as a judge, He forgets the transgressions of the pardoned ones. They are not before Him in court, and come not under His official ken.
2. In remembering, men also consider and meditate on things; but the Lord will not think over the sins of His people. I have known persons brood over an offence, as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings. The wrong grows worse as they think it over. They carefully observe the offence from different points of view, and whereas they were indignant at first, they nurse their wrath and make it so warm that it turns to fury. At first, they would have been satisfied with an apology; but when they have brooded over the injustice, it seems so atrocious that they demand vengeance on the offender. The merciful Lord doth not so to those who repent. No; for He saith, “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.”
3. Sometimes you have almost forgotten a thing, and it is quite gone out of your mind; but an event happens which recalls it so vividly, that it seems as if it were perpetrated but yesterday. God will not recall the sin of the pardoned. The transgressions of His people are dead and buried, and they shall never have a resurrection: “I will not remember their sins.”
4. This not remembering means that God will never seek any further atonement. Under the old law, there was remembrance of sins made every year on the day of atonement; but now the blessed One hath entered once for all within the veil, and hath put away sin for ever by the sacrifice of Himself, so that there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin. The Lord will never seek another expiatory offering. The sufferings of Jesus are so all-sufficient that no believer shall be made to suffer penalty for his unrighteousness.
5. When it is said that God forgets our sins, it signifies that He will never punish us for them. How can He, when He has forgotten them? Next, that He will never upbraid us with them,—“He giveth liberally and upbraideth not.” How can He upbraid us with what He has forgotten? He will not even lay them to our charge (Ezekiel 18:22; Romans 8:33-34).
6. When the Lord says, “I will not remember their sins,” what does it mean but this—that He will not treat us any the less generously on account of our having been great sinners? Look how the Lord takes some of the biggest sinners and uses them for His glory. When I think of Peter standing up on the Day of Pentecost, and three thousand being converted under his first sermon, I think no more of Peter’s failure and the cockcrowing. I can see that the Lord has forgotten his threefold denial, and placed him in the front to be a soulwinner. But the Lord Jesus not only uses His people, He honours then greatly. What honours He put upon the apostles, those men that forsook Him and fled in the hour of His passion! God has taken some here present, and has given them commission and ability to bring blood-bought souls to Himself. Is not this the sign of perfect forgiveness? Blessing He blesses us; yea, and makes us blessings. We shall have grace on earth, and glory in heaven. Surely all this proves that He has altogether blotted out our sins, and has determined to treat us as if we had been perfectly innocent.
III. FORGIVENESS IS TO BE HAD.
How? Through the atoning blood! Come for it in God’s appointed way. “Repent;” that is, be sorry for your sin; change your mind about it and hate it, though once you loved it. Then confess it, for He saith, “only acknowledge thine iniquity.” Chief of all, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved,” and that saving includes an act of amnesty and oblivion as to all your sinful thoughts, and words, and acts. Hast thou done this? Then thou art forgiven Never forget thy sin, nor the mercy which has forgiven it. Always repent and always praise the Lord. Honour the forgetfulness of God in not remembering thy faults, and henceforth do thou tell this blessed news to every one thou seest—there is forgiveness, such forgiveness as was never heard of until God Himself revealed it by saying of His people, “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more”.—C. H. Spurgeon: Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, No. 1685.
It is in standing well with God that the chief good of man consists. On this everything depends, both for time and eternity. As man is His creature, His child, there can be in the heart of God no other feeling towards him in this character than good-will and complacency. But one thing there is that has come between us and Him—sin, a thing that He cannot but hate; the one thing in all the universe against which His displeasure is declared. Yet it has proved the occasion of bringing out His love into fuller manifestation. He has been pleased to proclaim a free pardon, altogether irrespective of the nature and extent of our sins, and with no other condition attached to it than that we receive it as the gift of His grace. How great a blessing! The pledge of every other blessing that can come upon the soul. Needed by every one of us (H. E. I. 2329, 2330). Needed all through life, in death, and beyond death!
I. God undertakes to pardon sin for His own sake. It is against Him that we have sinned, and consequently it is only He that can forgive us. There is but one thing that can give hope to the guilty soul, and that is an assurance from God Himself that He will deal with it in mercy, and not remember it against us. Such an assurance He has given us; indeed it may be said to be the chief purpose of Revelation to convey this message of peace to our sinruined world, and commend it to our acceptance (Exodus 34:6-7; Isaiah 1:18; Psalms 86:5, &c.)
But it is not in love alone, but in righteousness as well that sin is forgiven. He has also made known to us the special provision which has been made for this purpose. The Son of God appears in this world in our nature, bears the burden of our sin, suffers and dies in homage to the law of righteousness, and rises from the dead as a sign that nothing more can be demanded either at His hands or at the hands of those whose representative He is (Romans 4:25; 1 Peter 3:18; 2 Corinthians 5:21). It is as the All-just, then, and not only as the All-merciful,—in His full character as the Righteous Father,—that God saves the soul from sin. This meets the demands of our moral nature. It is a righteous pardon that is conveyed in the Gospel, and as such it is proof against conscience, and law, and judgment, and all the terrors which it is in their power to summon against us.
Yet we must never cease to think of mercy as the grand source of salvation. Let no one suppose that the work of Christ was necessary in order to incline God to mercy (see p. 92, and H. E. I. 390). On the contrary, it was in His mercy that the plan of grace took its rise (John 3:16; 1 John 4:10). It is “for His own sake” that He pardons and saves,—not on the ground of anything lying outside His own nature, but on the ground of that love, so full and changeless, that it has been in His heart from of old, even from everlasting. And if it is “for His own sake,” in this high sense, how much more may we say that it is not by reason of anything in man that He pardons sin?
II. Let us now consider pardon as a thing which every one may look upon as put in his own power. It is the guilty that are in need of pardon; it is to them that it is offered; and as all men are guilty in the sight of God, the offer is intended to be co-extensive with the whole human family. [1402] This being so, with what shadow of reason can any one stand afar off, as if the message of peace were not intended for him?
[1402] As far as the proclamation of mercy is concerned, no one is excepted of any class or character, so that every one is warranted to take it to himself. Where there is no express exclusion, all must be held to be included. A whole province, let us suppose, has risen up in rebellion against its sovereign, and he might justly take punishment on all the inhabitants. Instead of this, however, he proclaims a free pardon through all its borders, among all ranks and classes of the people, whether leaders or followers in the revolt, whether more or less criminal, without exception or qualification of any kind. Such a proclamation would take in every individual in the land, and would at once put an end to fear and inspire universal confidence. For none could pretend, with any show of reason, that the king’s pardon was not meant for him, and that he had no warrant for embracing it. Now this is an exact representation of how the matter stands between the King of heaven and the inhabitants of this guilty world. As all are involved in the same sin, the same pardon is proclaimed to all.—Hutchison.
The offer of pardon is sometimes presented in a manner still more pointed and individualising. The individual is singled out from the mass, and has the offer made to him in as direct and personal a manner as if it were made to none beside him.
The offer applies to every one just in the state in which it finds him. Yet there are few things men are more slow to believe, than that a free and unconditional pardon is put in their own power.
“How can pardon have any reference to us, so long as our hearts are hard, cold, and impenitent, as we know them to be!” There are discases to which the body is liable of a very formidable kind, and which yet are attended with so little pain as to give the patient no alarm of his danger. But when the physician assures him of his real condition, and offers to cure him, would his insensibility to the disease be any good reason for saying that the remedy prescribed to him could have no application to his case? And so as to the sinner. This very want of feeling is itself a part of our sin; and therefore, to say that we dare not think of pardon until we get rid of it, is to say either that it is a sin which the mercy of God does not reach, or that it must be overcome in some way or other before it can be forgiven. But “the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin;” and this includes blindness, coldness, impenitence, not less than sin of any other kind, so that however insensate a man may be, he has full pardon put in his power. [1405] It is not merely to the humble and contrite that pardon is proclaimed, but to man simply as a sinner, with all his impenitence and all his insensibility (H. E. I. 942).
[1405] As to overcoming our insensibility or any other sin, as a prerequisite for pardon, that is a thing which it is not in any man to achieve. But suppose it were possible, and that it were made one of the conditions on which sin is forgiven, then pardon would come to be a kind of compromise between God and man—each going so far to meet the other—God doing so much in mercy, and man being expected to do the rest in the way of a meritorious movement towards God. Nor is this objection met even if we strike out the element of merit, and ascribe the movement to the grace of the Spirit; for this would be to reverse the Divine order of the two grand elements of salvation, as if holiness could come before pardon, and as if pardon were not the very first step in the way of life.—Hutchison.
III. The manner in which we close with the offer of pardon. As the offer is made to us in the free and unqualified form in which we have just described it, a simple acceptance of it is all that can be necessary. But what are we to understand by the acceptance of a gift of this nature? Faith is the only power by which we can deal with it. When some one whom you have offended tells you that he forgives you, all you have to do is to satisfy yourself that he is sincere in what he says, and trust in his honour to make it good; and at once the difference is at an end, and you have no more any uneasiness on the subject. In like manner, an offer of pardon is made to you by God: He cannot be insincere in making it. He can neither repent of it, nor prove unable to do as He has said. Rest in all this as true, trust in God for His own blessing, and in this state of mind you close with His great offer, and your sin is no more remembered against you (H. E I.1962).
IV. The acceptance of pardon will lead to two things,—Comfort and Holiness.
1. If we could realise all that is implied in it,—how deep the death from which we are saved, and how high and blessed the life which begins to open up to us; and could we take it home to ourselves in all its fulness, our consolation would be unspeakable (H. E. I. 306, 307). The man who has no belief that his sins are forgiven can have no comfort in the thought of God or eternity. But just in the degree in which you can trust in God for the pardon of which He has been pleased to assure you, you will have peace. To you He will be a Friend and a Father. There is joy also in the sense of pardon. Those who know what it is to be in distress of soul, as if the terrors of the Lord had been let loose upon them, and the pains of hell had taken hold upon them, and who pass from this into the peace of God, will be filled with gladness, and for a time perhaps with ecstasy. [1408]
[1408] But let no one reckon on the permanency of such emotions, nor despair when they sink down into a calmer state of mind, as if the mercy and faithfulness of the Most High were dependent on the variable flow of human feelings. As the man that but an hour before was counting the few swift days that seemed to lie between him and his doom, goes along the streets on his way from prison pardoned and free, we can suppose him to be so glad at heart that the very din and tumult of the busy crowds, as they hurry to and fro, are as music to his ear; and when he goes out into the fields and woods, he sees a beauty in the leaf and in the flower, and hears a melody in the song of the birds, such as he had never known before. But can it be supposed that rapture like this will continue for any length of time? And when it has given place to a calmer state of feeling, are we to say there is no comfort remaining? Emotion may and must subside, but there is a happiness bound up with a sense of safety that is sure to survive. And so with the man whose sins are forgiven, and who clings to this conviction in every variety of experience. Your hearts at times may be as dry as dust, yet doubt not even then that you are safe,—as clear of guilt in the eye of God, and as radiant in the white robes of righteousness, as at other times when the tide of feeling is at the fullest.—Hutchison (see also H. E. I. 2073, 2074).
2. The other result that may be expected to flow from an acceptance of the remission of sin is Holiness. No sooner do we receive the grace of reconciliation, than we enter into new relations, and begin to move in a new sphere: the whole of our spiritual surroundings are changed: “old things are passed away, and all things are become new.” The consequence of this will be a new tendency of thought and action. It is not in the spirit of a hireling, not for wages that we serve, but in love to one who loves us with an everlasting love, and at whose hands we receive infinitely more as a free gift than anything we could have ever earned for ourselves. Having been forgiven much, we love much. Here is the great spring of holiness,—love to the Holy One, and this blending with a regard for His holy will, and this, again, being inseparable from a feeling of active delight in His holy law.—George Hutchison, D.D.: Sermons, pp. 244–266.
This is a promise of forgiveness. Every criminal is liable to punishment, and fears it. Does not the child desire forgiveness when he has transgressed his father’s command? This promise is made to sinners. In promising or bestowing forgiveness, God does not exterminate sin. The accusation against the Jewish people is drawn out in Isaiah 43:22-24. Sin is universal. There are degrees of heinousness. Some have gone greater lengths than others, and sinned against greater light. There is more or less acknowledgment of sinfulness in all. Some are deeply convinced and awakened to concern. They are conscious of the alienation from God and exposure to wrath.
The Gospel proclaims forgiveness. It is a Gospel of mercy.
I. The text represents the Gospel forgiveness as Divine. “I, even I, am He.” It rested with Himself exclusively to determine whether mercy should be exercised; and if so, in what way. And it is His exclusive prerogative to exercise the mercy, if it is exercised at all. “Who can forgive sins, but God only?” No priest possesses this power. His words of absolution are ineffective, excepting as they declare God’s readiness to forgive. “But did not Jesus give this power to the Apostles?” (John 20:23). If He did, it would not follow that the power descended to any subsequent minister of Christ. The Apostles had no successors. But there is no instance recorded of their ever exercising this power. It is fair to infer that they did not possess it. The power conferred was simply ministerial. Power to declare the way of salvation, the forgiveness of sins. Possessed by every preacher. And by every Christian (Revelation 22:17).
He who alone can forgive does forgive. He has chosen to provide mercy. The text affirms it The Gospel affirms it. In this capacity He will be known to men. He is the sin-pardoning God. Encouraging to those who desire forgiveness.
II. The text represents the Gospel forgiveness as Gracious. “For mine own sake.” He must glorify Himself. The display of the Divine glory is intimately associated with and essential to His moral government. The mercy of the Gospel displays—
1. His love. Human sin is the fearful problem of the ages. But it gave occasion for the manifestation of an attribute which without it could not have been known. Divine love, in the exercise of forgiveness, becomes possible by sin. The truth that God is love stands forth more distinctly.
2. His righteousness. Seen in the method and grounds of forgiveness. What a father may do in the privacy of his family in relation to offences, is different from what a magistrate may do in his public capacity. The latter is bound to maintain the law without deviation. He is the representative of justice. In this capacity the Divine wisdom and righteousness have combined with love in providing mercy, after satisfying the demands of justice. Christ has made the satisfaction (H. E. I. 376).
3. His faithfulness. He revealed His saving purpose to the Jews. He has revealed His grace in Christ. His honour is bound to the pardon of all that accept the proclamation by believing in Jesus.
In providing mercy and exercising forgiveness He acts according to His own nature as well as for the sinner’s advantage. And the view of the Divine character which is presented by the Gospel is more calculated to secure honour, and trust, and love, and obedience than any other.
III. The text represents the Gospel forgiveness as Complete. “That blotteth out thy transgressions; and will not remember thy sins.” Here is the assurance of a true, because a complete forgiveness. There is a sense in which it is impossible for sin to be blotted out. Many of its effects must remain on ourselves and on others. Even suffering through sin after it is forgiven. The drunkard and the impure may have repented and found forgiveness in Christ, and yet the ruin of their health and affairs may not be repaired. Nothing can undo the past. Neither can God literally forget sin. His Omniscience retains everything for ever. Men say they may forgive, but cannot forget. They often mean something different from what He means. He blots out sin, when the sinner repairs to the Cross, as the record of a debt is blotted from the book; so that the debtor is treated as if he did not owe it. He will not remember sin against the sinner. It is as if the recipient of a past injury dismisses all feeling from his mind, and treats the offender as if he had not sinned. He reconciles him to Himself. He numbers him among His children (Psalms 32:1-2).
How interesting and attractive this representation of the Divine character. Have you contemplated God only with dread as the righteous Judge? Let His mercy be also taken into the account. His mercy does not destroy His justice; His justice consents to the exercise of mercy. For justice is satisfied when Jesus dies.
The subject suggests solemn inquiry. All are sinners. Are all our sins forgiven? Have we turned from sin? Have we trusted in the Saviour? Let there be a continued resting in Him. Let there be a steadfast current of the heart’s preferences towards God’s ways. Let there be watchful holiness and earnest usefulness.
Are your sins not forgiven? Living on with all the sins of your life against you as an uncancelled debt? Kind and amiable in your deportment; you would not wrong any man. Yet you live in this state of alienation from God. And you are allowing the opportunity of reconciliation to slip past you. You cannot say you are unforgiven because He is unwilling to forgive. Conscience says it is because you have never sought forgiveness, because you do not like the terms on which it is offered. You will not relinquish your sins. You will not come to Him that you might have life.
Do you say you would gladly come; that you earnestly desire forgiveness; that you are willing to have Christ if He will only have you? What have you to fear? Does not the Gospel proclaim the forgiving God? Come to Him then. “Through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins.”—J. Rawlinson.
There is one thing that God always does with sin. He removes it out of His presence. When He casts away a guilty soul, and when He pardons a penitent soul, He is doing the same thing—removing sin absolutely and infinitely. In the depth of His justice, I see the height of His mercy. There is not a greater distance between a soul in hell and heaven than there is between a pardoned man and a pardoned man’s sins. When we think of sin’s power and consequences, what can be compared with that single word, forgiveness?
I. THE AUTHOR OF FORGIVENESS. “I, even I,” an expression which denotes that God is taking to Himself, in some especial degree, some sovereign prerogative.
In earthly things, when a sovereign passes pardon, he has been aggrieved, indeed, in so far as the cause of justice is the cause of all; but still he has no personal injury to forgive. Or, when an offended man forgives his enemy, there comes across his mind the recollection that he must stand in need of pardon too. But now mark it with God. He is the being most nearly concerned in all the transgressions you have ever committed (H. E. I. 4478–4480). His law was broken; His empire disarranged; His mercy trampled upon; His love frustrated (Isaiah 43:24). But then, how grandly comes in the text! Were it that one God is injured and another God steps in to make the atonement and forgive, I should marvel less. But here lies the wonder, that God whom we provoke, despise, and neglect, originates the plan and conducts the scheme of mercy Himself.
Carry this thought a step further into the manner in which pardon of sin is procured. Men wish to do something to help their pardon. If they could feel more, pray more, do more, and be better than they are, they might hope for forgiveness. We want to find some reason in ourselves why God should forgive us. We endeavour to have before pardon that which will never come till after pardon. But how does God forgive? Like a sovereign: not because you are good, but because He is love. This is the hinging-point of the peace of thousands, who will not take forgiveness as an act of mercy.
Look, again, at the text in respect to the way by which the sense of forgiveness when it is granted is communicated to a man’s mind. This is the direct work of Almighty God, who has never communicated it to any man to do it. It belongs not to any living man to pronounce a sinner’s pardon in any other than a conditional or declaratory sense. If you desire a clear apprehension of God’s reconciling love, you must acknowledge that to Him alone it appertaineth to forgive sin. The Author of forgiveness, then, is God. All the attributes are brought to bear upon your peace—omnipotence, unchangeableness, love, justice. The pardoned sinner stands upon the eternal, leans upon the infinite, and looks out upon the unfading. It is the very Saviour who shed His life-blood, that says, “I, even I” (Romans 8:33-34).
II. THE NATURE OF FORGIVENESS.
1. In respect of time. The verb runs in the present tense. It is not “I have blotted,” nor, “I will blot,” but something far better. Probably, the metaphor is taken from a man obliterating with a sponge the record made upon a tablet. We think of God as unwilling to forgive; but He is ready, always waiting to blot out the record of every sin, as the mist that gathers round the mountain top is dispersed by the breeze. See, then, the Christian’s privilege. He looks up to God and he is forgiven. And He who forgives once goes on day after day forgiving. He does not upbraid, and say, “I forgave you yesterday, and I cannot forgive you to-day.” Sins are falling every moment upon that book, but the hand of love wipes out the record. A drop of blood fell on the page and washed it all away like snow. O try it! There is God waiting to wipe out every trace of your sin, if only you look up in simple faith to Him.
2. In respect of degree. I thank God for that little word “out.” None can read a trace where God’so bliterating hand has once passed. You never read of a partial cure wrought by Christ on earth, and you never find such a thing in the history of the Church as the partial healing of a man’s soul. Whatever God does is infinite. It is out—“blotteth out.” Some may feel, “God has forgiven me that sin, but not all my sins.” That is impossible. There never was the case of a man upon the earth who has had only one sin forgiven.
There is a distinction between “transgression” and “sin.” The former is the wicked act that lies upon the surface; the latter the deep corruption that lies within the heart. God blots out the transgressions, and will not remember the sins. He deals with both the stream and the fountain. Do not misunderstand me. God’s people commit sin, and are punished very heavily for it in this world after forgiveness. But sin is never imputed to a man in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1).
3. In respect of continuance. The present swells out into the future. It stretches on to your sick and dying bed; it meets you at the judgment-seat—“I will not remember.”
III. THE REASON OF FORGIVENESS. God finds all motive within Himself—“for mine own name’s sake.” You say, “Does not He seek the good of His creatures?” Yes; but the good of His creatures and His own glory are identical. You ask, “Why does God forgive a rebel creature?” The answer is nowhere in the creature. It is not in prayer, not in repentance, not in faith; but it is in God. Here is our confidence. God’s forgiveness is not like the ocean. It has the ocean’s depths, but not the ocean’s tides. Therefore He has based it, not on the universe, but on Himself. If the ground of your pardon rested on yourself or your fellow-creatures, on the holy motives you cherished, on the good deeds you performed, what hope could there be of forgiveness? The reason for forgiveness is found in that eternal counsel wherein God gave to His Son a kingdom; in God’s will that there should be a multitude round the throne of His glory; in that unfathomable love in which He is the loving Father of all His creatures; in justice, where, in faithfulness to His Son, He hath made it unjust to punish one pardoned in the Son; in that immutable wisdom wherein He hath given us an earnest of His forgiveness; but above all, seek it in that spot where His love, power, and wisdom stand out unitedly magnified, that purest revelation of His being, that bright effulgence of His name, wherein all meet—in the man Christ Jesus, the crucified, the risen Saviour.—James Vaughan, M.A.: Fifty Sermons, pp. 279–288.
I. Free grace blots out our transgressions FROM GOD’S BOOK.
II. WITH GOD’S HAND.
1. The recording hand.
2. The hand of Him against whom you have offended.
3. The rejected hand.
4. The avenging hand.
5. The spotless hand of justice.
6. The hand of the Supreme Being.
7. The hand of the unchanging God.
III. FOR GOD’S SAKE. “I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions, for mine own sake” (Ezekiel 36:21-22; Ezekiel 32). Everything God does is for His glory. “Of Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things.” “Of Him,” as the great cause; “through Him,” as the great worker; “to Him,” as the great end.
1. Is it for the glory of God to manifest His infinite wisdom? See it, in its brightness, in this work of salvation.
2. Is it for His glory to manifest His infinite justice? In the salvation of the Church, God has revealed that justice in its inflexible severity.
(1.) In the eternal plan of salvation by sacrifice.
(2.) Shining in the solemn glory of the cross of Emmanuel.
3. Is it for His glory to manifest His infinite power? See it in the fearful miracles of Egypt; in the merciful deeds of the great Miracle-Worker; in the pardoning of sins, the destroying of the works of the devil, the regeneration of the corrupt, the resurrection of the dead, the restoration of immortality, and the everlasting reign of righteousness.
4. Is it for His glory to manifest His infinite love? In the salvation of the Church it is revealed in its immeasurable greatness; in His compassion for the perishing, forbearance towards the rebellious, forgiveness of the repenting, and in His kindness to the believing.
IV. FROM GOD’S MEMORY. “I will not remember thy sins.” A heavenly truth in an earthly dress.—H. Grattan Guinness; Sermons, pp. 333–363.
If we were to ask, who need the forgiveness of sins? the ready answer would be, sinners. All men are sinners (Romans 3:10; Romans 3:12; Romans 3:23, and 1 John 1:8; 1 John 1:10). The dreadful reality of sin in us, and sin on us, making us sinners in the deepest sense, gives the teaching of the Word touching forgiveness a large and living interest to us all.
I. The fact that God forgives sin. Stated in Exodus 34:6-7; 2 Chronicles 7:14; Psalms 86:5; Psalms 130:4. Illustrated in David (Psalms 32:5). Sick of the palsy (Matthew 9:2). Woman in Simon’s house (Luke 7:48).
II. The meritorious ground on which God forgives. Christ Jesus (Colossians 1:14; 1 John 2:12; Acts 10:43; Romans 3:24-25). The question may be asked, What has Christ done that He forgives for His sake? See Hebrews 9:22-26; 1 Peter 3:18; Isaiah 53:5-6.
III. The conditions in us necessary to forgiveness. Repentance (John 1:9; Acts 3:19). Faith (Acts 13:38). Forsaking sin (Proverbs 28:13).
IV. The perfection of Divine forgiveness.
1. Sins are blotted out (Isaiah 43:25).
2. Totally removed from sight (Isaiah 1:18).
3. Forgotten for ever (Jeremiah 31:34; Hebrews 10:17).
V. The consequences of forgiveness. We have:—
1. Life (Colossians 2:13).
2. Blessedness in the soul (Psalms 32:1-2; 1 John 5:10).
3. Praise in the heart (Isaiah 12:1).
4. The fear of God (Psalms 130:4; Jeremiah 33:8-9).
5. Reconciliation with God (Luke 15:12-32).
6. Praise and joy (Romans 5:1-2).—J. A. R. Dickson.
We may learn:—
I. That it is God only who can pardon sin. How vain, then, is it for man to attempt it! How wicked for man to claim the prerogative! And yet it is an essential part of the Papal system, that the Pope and his priests have the power of remitting the penalty of transgression.
II. That this is done by God solely for His own sake. It is not—
1. Because we have any claim to it, for then it would not be pardon, but justice.
2. Nor have we any power to compel God to forgive—for who can contend with Him, and how can mere power procure pardon?
3. Nor have we any merit, for then also it would be justice; and we have no merit.
4. Nor is it primarily in order that we may be happy—for our happiness is a matter not worthy to be named, compared with the honour of God. But it is solely for His own sake; to promote His glory; to show His perfections; to evince the greatness of His mercy; and to show His boundless and eternal love.
III. They who are pardoned should live to His glory, and not to themselves. For that they were forgiven.
IV. If men are ever pardoned, they must come to God—and to God alone. They must come not to justify themselves, but to confess their crimes; and they must come with a willingness that God should pardon them on just such terms as He pleases; at just such a time as He pleases; and solely with a view to the promotion of His own glory. Unless they have this feeling, they never can be forgiven, nor should they be forgiven.—A. Barnes.
The text solves most of the problems arising out of our moral condition.
I. OUR NEED OF FORGIVENESS. This is evident on account of our transgressions. All guilty before God. The text refers to one species of moral evil—“transgressions”—violations of the Divine law. They are—
1. Diversified. Against both tables—Divine providences, &c.
2. Numberless.
3. Individual—distinctly ours.
4. Heinous. As committed against a good and gracious God, &c. As scarlet and crimson.
5. Recorded. Symbol of the text (Revelation 20:11. &c.)
6. Connected with Divine penalties.
7. No created being can deliver us from the results of our transgressions. No priest, &c. Jesus only.
II. THE DIVINE DECLARATION AS TO BLOTTING OUT TRANSGRESSION. Striking. I. the Creator (Isaiah 43:15); the Jehovah (Isaiah 43:3); the Holy One of Israel (Isaiah 43:3); your Redeemer (Isaiah 43:14).
1. He has sovereign right to do so.
2. His infinite love and mercy disposes Him to do so (Exodus 32:18, &c.)
3. This Divine nature and name Christ the Saviour possessed as the Son of God (Colossians 2:9). He was appointed the Mediator, and by and through His person, merit, and work we obtain forgiveness of sin. There is salvation in none other.
4. By faith in the Gospel of Christ, we realise the removal of our sins.
CONCLUSION.—God blots out all sin utterly and for ever. The erasure is complete. How solicitous we should be to hear God speaking thus to our hearts, by His Holy Spirit. There is no excuse for the unforgiven.—J. Burns, D.D., LL.D.: Sketches and Outlines, pp. 348.