Luke 5:8 When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord. Observe well what it was which led to this conviction of guilt in Peter's soul. Not terror, or judgment; not any view of the anger and justice of the Being with whom he had to do. It was simply the reception and consciousness of a very great and exceeding kindness. This made him love what he admired; and the love and the admiration which he felt to God became, by an easy change, hatred and detestation against himself. He was softened at the moment that he was convinced; and upon his melted heart and conscience he wrote the large, deep characters of sin, 1. The greatest and surest test of every man's state before God is this — How does he feel toward sin? It is a great thing to have faith enough to see the requirements of a holy God; faith enough to be conscious that there is a distance; faith enough to fear. 2. There is no feeling in Peter's breast akin to the desire to get rid of his religious thought. He was asking rather that which he thought he ought to ask, than what he wanted to ask. The humility was real; but it was not enlightened. It was exactly what every man ought to say and feel, if he saw only his own breast, and did not see the bosom of God. 3. This feeling operates differently, according to the moral temperament, or according to the stage in which a man may happen to stand in the Divine life. (1) In one, it becomes despair. The soul dares not to admit the thought that it could ever be received into the love of God. The dread of the sin of presumption — from which it is the farthest off — is always haunting it. The very name and joys of heaven seem a mockery to him. (2) In another man it destroys all sense of God's mercy. Peace, instead of being a fact, established by the Cross, and simply taken, is always a thing put off and off to some distant future. What is this but putting Christ away? (3) Others seek an intermediate agency between Christ and their soul. 4. It is an unspeakable comfort to know that this awful prayer, which Peter made in ignorance, was not answered. Christ did not depart from him. Thank God, He knows when to refuse a prayer. He never leaves those who are only ignorant. (J. Vaughan, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord. |
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