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ALL OF "GRACE QUOTES" FROM MARCH 2003 IN ONE FILE Afflictions, sorrows, trials (Henry Law, "Psalms" 1878) "It is God alone who judges; He brings one down, He exalts another. For the Lord holds a cup in His hand; it is full of foaming wine mixed with spices. He pours the wine out in judgment, and all the wicked must drink it, draining it to the dregs." Psalm 75:7-8 God's mode of dealing is often wrapped in mystery. We fail to understand why one is elevated to the highest rank, while others seem to waste their days in poverty, obscurity, and low estate. But no misgivings should arise. It should be firmly fixed in our persuasions that in all these matters God's hand prevails. Thus, also, afflictions, sorrows, trials are all appointed by the same unerring wisdom. His hand holds a cup which is mixed in accordance with His righteous will. According to His good pleasure He causes the sons of men to drink from it. But what will be the portion of the wicked? Let them tremble! They are forewarned that they must wring out the dregs indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish forever! He found it in the prison house of the devil (Henry Law, "Psalms" 1878) "Come and hear, all you who fear God, and I will declare what He has done for my soul." Psalm 66:16 Of what did the Psalmist speak? Of all that God had done for his soul. Oh! the breadth and length, the depth and height, of this most marvelous declaration! He visited his soul in darkness, and gave the light of life! He found it in the prison house of the devil, and translated it into the kingdom of grace and glory! He saw it laden with all iniquities, and removed the total burden! He saw it filthy in all the mire of evil, and clothed it with the garments of righteousness and salvation! Such is the theme of the believer's story; but heaven must be reached and eternity exhausted, before the whole can be told. Are there no exceptions? (Henry Law, "Psalms" 1878) The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, and their ways are vile; there is no one who does good. Psalm 53:1 The heart is the true mirror of the man. Its language speaks the real character. If we could hear the secret whispers of a graceless heart, the sound would be uniformly evil. The godless cherish the delusion that there is no being greater than themselves. Their conceit ignores divine supremacy, and scorns to yield to a superior yoke. Such men exist in fearful numbers. The faithful Word declares it, and truly adds that they are fools! They may pride themselves in imagined wisdom, but their real place is in the depths of ignorance. Their light is darkness. Their boasted knowledge is extremest folly. It follows that from atheism in heart, comes wickedness in life. The spring being impure, what can flow from it but defilement? The tree is rotten at the core; the branches cannot be sound. Their works, the emblems of their hearts, can only be abomination. They only pollute the earth; hateful to God, injurious to man. Are there no exceptions? Not one by nature! There is no good but what the Holy Spirit implants. Where He is absent only evil dwells, and He has no abode in unregenerate men. The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." They are corrupt, and their ways are vile; there is no one who does good. Psalm 53:1 To love a worm! (Spurgeon, "The Joy of the Lord" #1027) Does it not make a man glad to know that though once his sins had provoked the Lord, they are now all blotted out, not one of them remains; though once he was estranged from God, and far off from him by wicked works, yet he is made near by the blood of Christ. The Lord is no longer an angry judge pursuing us with a drawn sword; but a loving Father into whose bosom we pour our sorrows, and find ease for every pang of heart. Oh, to know, that God actually loves us! I have often told you I cannot preach upon that theme, for it is a subject to muse upon in silence, a matter to sit by the hour together and meditate upon. The Infinite, to love . . . an insignificant creature, an ephemera of an hour, a shadow that declines! Is not this a marvel? For God to pity me I can understand. For God to condescend to have mercy upon me I can comprehend. But for Him to love me; for the pure One to love a sinner, for the infinitely great One to love a worm, is matchless, a miracle of miracles! There is a great deal of profession (J. West, "Spiritual Desires Satisfied in Christ" 1858) There is a great deal of profession in the present day. But it is one thing to profess to be a Christian, and another thing to be a broken hearted follower of a despised Christ. Empty bubbles! (Henry Law, "Psalms") "I have hated those who regard lying vanities. But I trust in the Lord. I am overcome with joy because of Your unfailing love, for You have seen my troubles, and You care about the anguish of my soul." Psalm 31:6-7 Many vain cheats are impudent to deceive us! Riches, honors, titles, reason, intellect, invite us to rely on their aid. But they are empty bubbles. Their promises are fraud. The believer flees with abhorrence from those who walk in these deceits. He has a large volume of experience. In trouble he has found that God's thoughts were on him. All his adverse circumstances have been lovingly regarded. In all his ways of sorrow God has been by his side. "I have hated those who regard lying vanities. But I trust in the Lord. I am overcome with joy because of Your unfailing love, for You have seen my troubles, and You care about the anguish of my soul." Psalm 31:6-7 Strong, immutable, and eternal (Henry Law, "Psalms") "Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close." Psalm 27:10 Earthly relationships are easily dissolved. Affection may decay. Fickleness begets estrangement. Distance may part. Death comes, and desolation sits where happy fellowship once reigned. But God's love is strong, immutable, and eternal. His heart beats with tenderness, and is incapable of diminution or of change. O Father, ever be a Father unto us! "Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close." Psalm 27:10 The very thought is horror! (Henry Law, "Psalms") "Don't let me suffer the fate of sinners." Ps. 26:9 There is a bundle of tares that shall be burned. Hell is no fiction! The very thought is horror! What must be the dreadful reality! The saddest picture of man's malignity! (Henry Law, "Psalms") "My enemies surround Me like a herd of bulls; fierce bulls of Bashan have hemmed Me in! Like roaring lions attacking their prey, they come at Me with open mouths." Ps. 22:12-13 We return in spirit to the cross. The dying Jesus looks around; multitudes encircle Him. With open mouth ferociously they assault Him. Throughout the mass there is no sign of pity; all hearts seem dead to common feelings of humanity; they show the properties of the wildest beasts; they are savage as the untamed bull; they thirst for blood as the devouring lion. This is the saddest picture of man's malignity! What frightful fury raged against Jesus, the perfect model of holiness and love! His only offense was that He walked this earth as God. We see what man is when no grace restrains. If we love Jesus, whom the world thus hated, let us give praise to God's Grace, which causes us to differ. Evil will not die until our Lord returns! (Henry Law, "Psalms") "O righteous God, who searches minds and hearts, bring to an end the violence of the wicked, and make the righteous secure." Psalm 7:9 Sights and sounds of evil are anguish to a pious heart. They pain him, because they are abhorrent to his new nature. He turns from them as images of Satan; he loathes them as rebellion against God. Hence he burns with desire that they may be repressed. Hence he wearies heaven with cries that God would drive iniquity into outer darkness. But evil will not die until our Lord returns! Only then shall the wickedness of the wicked reach its end. Faith waits expectantly for the blissful reign; it visits in anticipating thought the new heavens and the new earth. In heaven, there is no form of sin; its hideous features are forever gone. The reign of righteousness has come. Each heart is holy. Each look reflects God's image. Every sound is pure. All is transcendent happiness, for all is holiness. No evil will pollute the glorious scene. Outside is sin and all sin's slaves. Within is the Lamb's bride, all glorious in her robes of white! He sits on the calm throne of eternal serenity! (Henry Law, "The Gospel in Exodus") Jesus cannot change. He is as constant as He is great. As surely as He ever lives, so surely He ever lives the same. He sits on the calm throne of eternal serenity! Change is the defect of things below. Our brightest morn often ends in storm. Summer's radiance gives place to winter's gloom. The smiling flower soon lies withered. The babbling brook is soon a parched channel. The friend who smiled, smiles no more friendly welcomes. Bereavement weeps where once the family beamed with domestic joy. Gardens wither into deserts. Babylons crumble into unsightly ruins. On all things a sad inscription writes . . . fleeting! transient! vanishing! Time flaps a ceaseless wing, and from its wings, decay and death drop down. But Jesus sits high above all this. He is 'the same yesterday, and today, and forever.' The love of Jesus is in perpetual bloom. It is always in summertime. The roots are deeply buried in Himself; therefore the branches cannot fade. Believer, drink hourly of this cup of joy. Christ loved you fully when, in the councils of eternity, He received you into His heart. He loved you truly when, in the fullness of time, He took upon Himself your curse, and drained your hell deep dues. He loved you tenderly when He showed you, by the Spirit, His hands and His feet, and whispered to you that you were His. He loves you faithfully while He ceases not to intercede in your behalf, and to scatter blessings on your soul. He will love you intensely in heaven when you are manifested as His precious purchase and crowned as His bride! The Shield (Henry Law, "Psalms") So many are saying, "God will never rescue him!" But You, O Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, and the One who lifts my head high. Psalm 3:2-3 In darkest days faith shines with brightest glow. In the wild storm it looks to God and sings. No weapon can succeed against it. No billows can submerge it. God, even God Himself, surrounds His children as a shield. The shaft which touches them must pierce through God! These boasted joys? (Henry Law, "The Incense Altar") You may have wealth. It cannot profit long. You may have health. Decay will cause its flower to fade. You may have strength. It soon will totter to the grave. You may have honors. A breath will blast them. You may have flattering friends. They are but as a summer brook. These boasted joys often now cover an aching heart, but . . . they never gave a grain of solid peace; they never healed a wounded conscience; they never won approving looks from God; they never crushed the sting of sin. Chasing bubbles on perdition's brink? (Henry Law, "The Golden Lampstand") Without Christ, the affairs of this world are but a puzzled maze. Poor blinded man sees nothing as it really is. He does not know the true end of his being. He imagines the tinsel to be gold. He counts the true gold as dross. He treasures up the chaff as wheat. All his view is bounded by time's narrow line! All his heart is fixed on vanity's vain trifles! He chases bubbles on perdition's brink! He profits no one and he ruins himself! The school of trial (Henry Law, "The Smitten Rock") Believer, do not think of undisturbed repose until the flesh is forever dropped. There is a ceaseless cycle of sorrow and temptation here in this world. But do not despise the scourge. It has a teaching voice. It is held by a loving Father's hand. Hence the command, 'Hear the rod, and Him who has appointed it.' The school of trial best discloses . . . the hidden vileness of the heart, and the vast riches of a Savior's grace! Sin for you! (Suzanna Wesley) Whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off your relish for spiritual things; is sin for you, however, innocent it may be in itself. WHAT IS TIME? (David Harsha, "Come to the Savior") Time is a stream which is rapidly bearing us all to the boundless ocean of eternity! Let us ask again, with all seriousness, WHAT IS TIME? I asked an aged man, a man of cares, Wrinkled, and curved, and white with hoary hairs; "Time is the warp of life," he said, "Oh tell, The young, the fair, the gay, to weave it well!" I asked the ancient, venerable dead, Sages who wrote, and warriors who bled; >From the cold grave a hollow murmur flowed, "Time sowed the seed we reap in this abode!" I asked a dying sinner, before the tide Of life had left his veins: "Time!" he replied; "I've lost it! ah, the treasure!" and he died. I asked the golden sun and silver spheres, Those bright chronometers of days and years; They answered, "Time is but a meteor glare," And bids us for Eternity prepare. I asked the Seasons, in their annual round, Which beautify or desolate the ground; And they replied (no oracle more wise), "Tis folly's blank, and wisdom's highest prize!" I asked a lost spirit, but oh, the shriek That pierced my soul! I shudder while I speak! It cried, "a particle! a speck! a mite Of endless years, duration infinite!" I asked my Bible and it said, "Time is the present hour, the past is fled; Live! live today! tomorrow never yet On any living being rose or set!" I asked Old Father Time himself at last; But in a moment he flew swiftly past– His chariot was a cloud, the viewless wind His noiseless steeds; which left no trace behind. I asked a mighty angel, who shall stand One foot on sea, and one on solid land; "By Heaven," he cried, "I swear the mystery's o'er; "Time was," he cried, "but Time shall be no more!" Let us ask again, with all seriousness, WHAT IS TIME? Time is the path to GLORY, or the path to HELL! Each mother's infant? (Henry Law, "The Healer") Let us remove the mask, then, and behold the multiform malignity of this fiend, SIN. Sin is a universal taint. No child escapes it. We tread this earth diverse . . . in climate, in station, in mental power, in mold of temper, and in frame of body. But all who breathe life's breath are spotted with this plague! Adam's foul fall infused the evil poison into human nature's veins. Each parent sows this seed. No offspring is infection free. Cain was conceived in sin. The last babe born must be corruption's heir. Reader! your cradle may have been wealth's downy pillow, or poverty's harsh provisions. You may have intellect to command a gazing world's applause, or you may crawl unknown to an unknown grave. In these externals no two may be the same. But all are one in oneness of distempered soul. Each mother's infant is transgression's child. Sin is an all spoiling evil. It is a weed which overruns the garden. It stains all men, and every part in each. It enters to pervade. Its root is in the soul. But its fibers and its branches spread through each faculty of mind and body. See how it masters the whole inner frame. The heart first sickens. This becomes harder than the nether millstone, the nest of every unclean bird, the den of lust's vile brood. The head soon grows distempered. Hence error and ignorance expel right judgment. The world is worshiped as a rightful lord. Hell is derided as some weak fable. Repentance is reserved for dying moments. The glorious Word is scorned as the bewildered page in which the brainsick and fanatic glean delusions. The eye is blind to see the 'chief among ten thousand, the altogether lovely One.' The ear hears nothing but discord in the Gospel melody. The palate has no relish of healthful food. The lips, the mouth, the throat, the tongue, are festered with contaminating sores. Alas! how many words go forth to spread contagion and to scatter death. Thus the disease runs wildly through the whole man! Sin is the union of all spiritual maladies in one compacted mass. It is no solitary evil. It comes in troops, in flocks, in swarms! Sin's end is endless death. Its course is sure. The stream flows on until the ocean's bed is reached. Thus sin's strong bias rushes to the pit of hell. Oh! mark those writhing sufferers in the burning lake! Ask them what brought them to their woe. One wild shriek answers, Sin! Sin uncured, unchecked! This sketch is dark. The reality is far darker. But why are these black colors laid? The malady's malignity is drawn to show that one Physician alone can avail. "I am the Lord, who heals you." Exodus 15:26 Yes, Father (MacDuff, "Memories of Gennesaret" 1887) Here is the secret of strength in encountering our seasons of trial and difficulty: the conviction that our times are in the hands of God; thus leading to complete and entire subordination of our wills to His. How it would disarm affliction and bereavement of their bitterest stings if we were enabled to give as the history of our darkest dispensations, "This is my heavenly Father's will. The hour has come; the hour appointed by His loving wisdom." The Christian, like his Lord, is able to view every occurrence as emanating from . . . a Hand of infinite love, a Mind of infinite wisdom, and a Will of infinite faithfulness. Every phase in his history; every step in his pilgrimage; its most trifling incidents and circumstances; are Divinely appointed. Feeling that he is under this kind and gracious guardianship, he resolves his own will into the will of The Supreme! All that concerns him is a part of a vast harmonious plan. The future (mazy, dark, mysterious,) is fully known to One who sees the end from the beginning; educing good out of seeming evil; and order out of apparent confusion. Even when a cross looms gloomily on his path, he breathes with unmurmuring lips, "Yes, Father, for this was Your good pleasure." Matthew 11:26 An ark of safety in the flood of vanities? (Henry Law, "The Burning Bush") "It was by faith that Moses, when he grew up, refused to be treated as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He chose to share the oppression of God's people instead of enjoying the fleeting pleasures of sin. He thought it was better to suffer for the sake of the Messiah than to own the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking ahead to the great reward that God would give him." Hebrews 11:24-26 Worldly pomp is very dazzling! Worldly luxury is very entrancing! Worldly pleasures are very ensnaring! But there is an ark of safety in the flood of vanities, as in the flood of waters. Moses is neither dazzled, nor entranced, nor ensnared. He looks above, and sees a splendor far more bright. He deliberately chooses scorn and affliction and loss and poverty, with the people of God. And he finds . . . such scorn to be the truest honor; such affliction to be the purest joy; such loss to be the richest gain; such poverty to be the most enduring wealth. Reader! it is an important principle, that none can tread the world beneath their feet until they see a fairer world above their heads! When the Lord is set before you, your eyes are dim to lower objects. The beauty of the all beauteous One, makes other loveliness unlovely! Moses proves the mighty energy of soul elevating, soul purifying faith. This stirring principle turns his whole course from ease and affluence and self, into one stream of daring activities for God. Sodom will be better off! (MacDuff, "The Doomed City" 1887) "I assure you, Sodom will be better off on the judgment day than you." Matthew 11:24 Alas! alas! Is it not to be feared that many are content with having "a name to live," who are spiritually dead. There are thousands who come to our churches, who hear the preacher, who assent to the message, but go back from listening to the tremendous themes of Death, Judgment, and Eternity, to plunge deep as ever into engrossing worldliness and sin. The preacher may be heard; his words may fall like lulling music on the ear, but the gates of the soul are firmly locked and barred against admission. The preacher may thunder his rebukes, but some heart sin and life sin, will, in spite of them, be retained and caressed. Are there none now reading these words, whom the Savior would begin to "upbraid," because they have not repented? When His scrutinizing eye looks down, Sabbath after Sabbath, upon listening audiences throughout our land, all apparently solemn, sincere, outwardly devout, does He not discern, lurking underneath this fair external guise, the signs and symptoms of loathsomeness and decay; like the pure virgin snow covering the charred and blackened ruin? Ah! sermons will not save us! Church going will not save us! Orthodoxy in creed and party will not save us! Repent! Repent! is the sharp, shrill call of the Gospel trumpet! There must be . . . a change of heart; a change of life; a crucifixion of sin; and with full purpose of heart, a cleaving unto the Lord who died for us! Solving the great problem of fretful, careworn, restless, suffering humanity? (MacDuff, "Memories of Gennesaret" 1887) The world resorts to many expedients for the improvement of man, solving the great problem of fretful, careworn, restless, suffering humanity apart from the gospel. The philosopher may dream of visionary earthly antidotes. The politician may see in some cold, frigid, intellectual training a panacea for human wrongs. The moralist may discourse on human virtue, and the self rectifying power of human goodness. The socialist may dare to propound his damning theories as the pioneers of the halcyon reign of unbounded liberty. But we have boldness and confidence that Christ, and Him crucified, and the new life which this Lord of life has to impart, are the true and only secrets of peace on earth and good will to men. Two pennies? (MacDuff, "Memories of Gennesaret" 1887) While Jesus was in the Temple, He watched the rich people putting their gifts into the collection box. Then a poor widow came by and dropped in two pennies. "I assure you," He said, "this poor widow has given more than all the rest of them. For they have given a tiny part of their surplus, but she, poor as she is, has given everything she has." Luke 21:1-4 He is unworthy of the name of Christian, whose every thought begins, centers, and terminates in self; a cold, frigid icicle, chilling all who come within his reach; when he gives, giving grudgingly; and what he gives, costing him no sacrifice. Sacrifice of some sort, either of substance, or time, or personal effort, is necessarily involved in every deed of true beneficence. It was not the gifts of costly munificence, thrown with supercilious air into the Treasury, which the Savior valued; but the widow's two pennies, the little earnings which a grateful, giving heart doled out of her poverty, and which made her evening's meal simpler and scantier than otherwise it would have been. Let us learn anew, the lesson of self sacrifice. The world, with its millions of starving outcasts; are famishing in spiritual destitution! Have we, abridged our own comforts to minister to theirs? Is it not the duty of each to ask, before God, "What can I spare? Is there no needless expenditure; no lavish waste; no foolish luxuriance; nothing that could be spared in my house or my table, in my social feasts, that, instead of going to feed and pamper that love of extravagance which is running wild in all modern society, could go to help reach the unsaved? O my soul, is this all satisfying treasure yours? (Henry Law, "Christ is All" 1864) The true Christian is called . . . to many relinquishments; to much self denial; to constant trampling on earth's gilded baits. But every relinquishment is wealth; and every loss is gain. For he who leaves all for Christ, receives more than all in Christ. This is a plain inscription over the portal of the heavenward path: "Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way." He, then, who would enter, must be stripped of all those flowing robes, in which men flaunt and swell in nature's broad road. Self righteousness must be torn off to its every shred. This is the very flaying of the soul. Dependence on imagined merit adheres as the very skin. But it all must yield. Self, in its most cherished form, must be despised and hated, as an abominable thing. All our darling excellences, all our fond conceits, all our superiorities must be rejected as a filthy rag. It is hard work to cast all this away, and to go naked to be clothed by Jesus. But, if ever we would be saved, it must be done. So, also, every hope, which finds a savior in the externals of rites and services, and means of grace, must be ground to powder and given to the winds. Christ must be embraced, unaided and alone, or not at all. I need scarcely add, that every sweet sin, which has long been caressed in the recesses of the heart, must be dragged to the light and slain. This is oftentimes as the plucking out the right eye. But there must be no sparing. Christ is light. Sin is darkness. How can they be one? Sin loved, indulged, retained, binds fast the soul to the wheels of the chariot in which Christ cannot sit. Again, the love of the world, in . . . its foolish vanities, its empty shows, its godless maxims, its defiling pleasures, its lying principles, its soul beclouding books, and all its idol worship of talent, wit, and falsely called glory; must be nailed to the cross! Its conformity must be shunned, as poison! Its touch must be shunned, as a viper's sting! The heart must have no throne, but for Christ. This walk is a departure from nature's country, from sin's kindred, and from the devil's home. It is a march towards a land, which Christ will give. It requires many efforts, and many struggles, and many conflicts, thus to take up the Christian's staff, and to put on the Christian's sandal, and to spurn all things dear to nature and to self. But what is rejected? Nothing but husks and shadows! Nothing but vexation, and disappointment, and misery! Nothing but . . . an oppressive load, a mocking shadow, a gnawing anxiety, a weary chase after emptiness, a groaning under present burden, a dread of future reckoning! What is gained? The substance of all good, the perfection of all excellence, in Christ. He welcomes to the secret chambers of His love. He opens His heart. He turns . . . all dross to gold, all clouds to sunshine, all sighs to songs, and earth to the very gate of heaven! O my soul, is this all satisfying treasure yours? Unequaled, unparalleled, and unsurpassed! (Octavius Winslow, "None Like Christ") There is no love like the love of Christ. His love . . . chose you, ransomed you, called you, and soothes you. His eyelid never closes. His affections never change. His warmth never chills. His hand is never withdrawn. The love of Christ stands out in the history of love as the divinest, the holiest, the strongest of all love; unequaled, unparalleled, and unsurpassed! Truly there is no love like the love of Christ What is it that is drawing you to Heaven? (John MacDuff, "Memories of Patmos") Reader! if you are looking forward to taking your place as a worshiper in the upper Sanctuary, the same Divine Being who will form the center and focus of your bliss there, should form the center and substance of your happiness here. Test the reality of your hopes by this. What is it that is drawing you to Heaven? Is it some dreamy indefinite idea of material splendor? Is it a place of exemption from sorrow and suffering, where every wish is satisfied, and the very fountain of tears is dried? This may be, and doubtless will be, all true. But are its Mansions desirable, because they are the dwelling place of your God? If at this moment it were divested of all its other attractions, would it be enough to know that "God shall be with them and be their God?" The Scriptures point to Me! (Octavius Winslow, "Morning Thoughts") "But the Scriptures point to Me!" John 5:39 Search the Scriptures, my reader, with a view of seeing and knowing more of your Redeemer, compared with whom nothing else is worth knowing or making known. Love your Bible, because it testifies of Jesus; because it unfolds a great Savior, an almighty Redeemer; because it reveals the glory of a sin pardoning God, in the person of Jesus Christ. Aim to unravel Jesus in the types, to grasp Him amid the shadows, to trace Him through the predictions of the prophet, the records of the evangelist, and the letters of the apostles. All speak of, and all lead to, Jesus! The Almighty is a weak babe! (Henry Law, "Christ is All" 1854) "Unto you is born a Savior, who is Christ the Lord." Wonder of wonders! The mighty God, without ceasing to be God, becomes man to redeem us! Let the greatest king become the lowest beggar; let the richest prince leave his palace for the vilest cell of a loathsome prison; it is as nothing compared to the act of Jesus, when He left heaven to put on the rags of our mortality! The Creator of all things becomes a creature! The Almighty is a weak babe! The Eternal is a child of time! The Infinite is contracted into the limits of poor flesh! Is not this the wonder of wonders? Is not this grace which has no bounds? A brilliant folly! (Henry Law, "Christ is All" 1864) Without a saving knowledge of Jesus, all other knowledge is a brilliant folly! The pearl (John MacDuff, "The Shepherd and His Flock") As the pearl would remain forever in the depths of the ocean unless the diver descended for it; so, unless He who purchased us as gems and jewels for His crown had taken us from the depths of sin, there we would have remained forever. And as He rescues the pearl, so He keeps it, polishes it, and finally inserts it in His eternal diadem! God remembers! (Bonar, "Human Heedlessness; Divine Remembrance") "They do not realize that I remember all their evil deeds. Their sins engulf them; they are always before Me." Hosea 7:2 What is sin? It is not . . . an accident, nor an imprudence, nor a misfortune, nor a disease, nor a weakness. It may be all these, perhaps; but it is something beyond all these; something of a more fatal and terrible character. Sin is guilt. Sin is crime. Man's tendency is either to deny, or to extenuate sin. He either pleads not guilty, or he smoothes over the evil; giving it specious names. Or if he does not succeed in these, he casts the blame off himself; he shifts the responsibility to . . . his nature, his birth, his circumstances, his education; even to God himself! But human sin is not thus to be diluted or transformed into a shadow. It is infinitely real; true; deep; terrible in the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. Let us not trifle with sin, either in the conscience or the intellect. Let us learn its true nature from the terribleness of the wrath and condemnation threatened by God against every sin, great or small. God remembers our sins! His memory never fails in anything. Nothing escapes it, great or small. Nothing effaces anything from it. Time does not efface it. Ages blot out nothing. The past is as clear and full as the present. Other events do not efface it. Our own forgetfulness will not efface it. Our memory and God's are very different. Our forgetfulness does not make Him forget. Though man should forget, God remembers; and He can call up sin to remembrance. It will and must come up at last. Men may try to forget it; to drown all thought of it; to efface all traces of it; but it will come up! God remembers! Nothing can make Him forget. He may seem to do so; but it is only seeming. God remembers... the person; the time; the circumstances; the thing itself; public or secret. God remembers our sins! "God does not remember sin!" is the world's great motto! "They do not realize that I remember all their evil deeds. Their sins engulf them; they are always before Me." Hosea 7:2

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