Romans 5:10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled… 1. Among the ten thousand plants that clothe the naked world, none are found where the execution falls short of the design. Nor among the countless tribes of animals does God, in any case, appear to have begun a work and stopped in the middle. He never made an unfinished flower or insect; and it were strange if He should make an unfinished saint. 2. "Wherefore hast Thou made all men in vain?" "I saw the prosperity of the wicked...Verily I have cleansed my heart in vain, and washed my hands in innocency. For all day long have I been plagued." These plaints prove that Providence is not so easily read as nature. But that is because Providence is not, like creation, a finished work. Take a man to a house when the architect is in the middle of his plan, what is perfect order to the architect, to the other will be confusion; and so stands man amid that vast scheme of Providence which God began six thousand years ago, and may not finish for as many thousand years to come. Raised to the throne of Egypt, Joseph saw why God had permitted him to be sold into slavery and cast into prison. And raised to heaven, the saint, now that God's works of Providence stand before him in all their completeness, shall take his harp, and sing, "Just and true are Thy ways, Thou King of Saints." 3. Now, God's work in grace forms no exception to His works in nature and in Providence. A man designs a great literary work, and he dies; or throwing it aside for something else, he leaves the world but a fragment of it. The studio of the painter has unfinished pictures; our streets have unfinished houses; and man has many a plan lodged in his busy brain that he never or but partly executes. But where God begins a good work He carries it on to the day of the Lord Jesus. Consider — I. OUR STATE BY NATURE — We are the enemies of God. 1. Some things we are to believe on the simple authority of God's Word. There are others, again, in which, "as face answereth to face in water," so the state of our hearts answereth to the statements of God's Word; and such is the case with Paul's saying, "The carnal mind is enmity against God." For was there ever a saved man who did not feel when he was converted that he was conquered? This enmity does not lie in bad habits, education, or other such circumstances. It is not like a cold which anyone may take, but a consumption which is constitutional and hereditary; and what are all these sins and crimes which the apostle describes as works of the flesh (Galatians 5:19); but, like the flushed cheek, languid eye, and bounding pulse of fever, the symptoms of an enmity that lies lurking in every heart? The temptations that call out the enmity no more create it than the showers and sunshine create the deadly hemlock which has its seed in the soil. 2. Nor is this all. Consumption, fell and deadly as it is, usually attacks but one organ. The constitution may be otherwise sound. The best things, indeed, have their defects — there are spots in the sun; there is more or less of alloy in all gold; and weeds deform the fairest gardens. But whenever circumstances occur to call it out, this enmity affects the whole man; so that he is as much under its influence as every sail, yard, mast, and timber of a ship are under the government of her helm. True, that does not always appear; but no more does the fire that sleeps in the cold flint, until there be a collision with steel. The carnal mind not only has, but is, enmity against God. Enmity is of its very nature, as it is of the nature of grass to be green, or sugar to be sweet, or vinegar to be sour. If it were not so, man would not need to be born again to get a new heart; like a watch that had but started a jewel, or lost the tooth of a wheel, it were enough to be repaired without being renewed. 3. What a proof of this we have in the treatment of Christ by man. Fancy a drowning man putting forth his dying strength to wound the hand stretched out to save him! I would hold any man my enemy that would kill my son; and if men by nature were not God's enemies, why did they kill His Son? why do they still reject Him? II. THE RECONCILIATION. The time has come when Jacob must face an angry brother. He had taken cruel advantage of Esau's necessities and ungodliness, to possess himself of the birthright and the blessing. He had to settle the account with his brother now; and the prospect, as well it might, filled him with alarm. Busy, guilty, fancy conjures up a dreadful retribution. What shall he do? Fight? It is vain to think of that. Flee? Encumbered with wives and little ones, it is vain to think of fleeing. One refuge is still open to him! He betakes himself to prayer; wrestling with God till the break of day. I have seen the sun set on a troubled sea where the billows burst in white foam on rocky headlands, and roared in thunders on the beach; and tomorrow the same sun set on the same sea, smooth as a glassy mirror. A change as great, and in as short a time, has passed on the soul of Jacob. Yesternight was spent in an agony of prayer; and this night he lays his head in sweet peace on its pillow. The long estranged brothers have embraced and buried in one grave Esau's wrongs and Jacob's crimes — being enemies, they were reconciled. Blessed change to Jacob; and yet but a faint image of our reconciliation to God! What is that? what does it imply? what blessings does it bring? We shall never know fully till we get to heaven; "for eye hath not seen," etc. But this, meanwhile, we know, reconciliation is sin pardoned; death discrowned; peace of conscience; a sense of Divine love; a sight of coming glory. III. THE MEANS OF RECONCILIATION. A man lying under sentence of death has sent off a petition for mercy, and waits the answer in anxious suspense. One day his ear catches rapid steps approach his door — they stop there. The chain is dropped; the bolts are drawn; a messenger enters with his fate; the sovereign pities the criminal, but cannot pardon the crime. His hopes dashed to the ground, he gives himself up for lost. And now the messenger draws near, and tells him that if the king's son would change places with him and die in his room, that would satisfy justice, and set him free. Drowning men will catch at straws; not he at that. The king give up his son! If there is no hope but that, there is no hope at all! Now fancy, if you can, his astonishment, sinking to incredulity, and then rising into a paroxysm of joy, when the messenger says, I am the king's son; it is my own wish, and my father's will that I should die for you; take you the pardon, and give me the fetters. In me shall the crime be punished; in you shall the criminal be saved. Such love never was shown by man; only by God. Did David, when he considered the heavens the work of God's fingers, exclaim, What is man that Thou art mindful of him? How much more may God's people break out into expressions of adoring wonder, when they stand beneath the Cross. IV. RECONCILED BY THE DEATH OF CHRIST, HIS PEOPLE ARE SAVED BY HIS LIFE. Suppose that our Lord, having satisfied Divine justice, had left in the grave a body which He needs no more, and returned to the bosom of His Father, still the Son of God, but no longer also the Son of Man, His death had been in vain. There was the medicine, but where was the physician to administer it? When we die our work is done. Not so with Christ. He had a great work to do after His death — a work foreshadowed on the day of atonement in the temple. The high priest, having sacrificed a lamb, carries its blood into the holy of holies; offering it before the mercy seat. By and by, returning with the blood, he takes a bunch of hyssop, and sprinkles it in red showers on the people. Now are they ceremonially clean before the Lord; and so David, with his eyes no doubt on better blood, prays, Sprinkle me with hyssop and I shall be clean; wash me and I shall be whiter than the snow. Even so, Jesus rises from yonder grave and ascends to yonder throne, that He may apply to His people the benefits of His redemption. He lives to provide for our wants and to advocate our cause; so that our life is as much dependent on His as that of the branches on the tree, or the body's various members on the life of their heart and head. Because He liveth we live also. We attach little value to what costs us little. Of all men they are the most careful of their money who have earned it by the hardest labour; they guard their liberties most jealously Who have bought them at the greatest price. The great price at which Christ purchased His people is the great security for their safety. (T. Guthrie, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. |
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