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shaking of the ground from under us— but, instead of these, why it is that all is going on in its wonted order, and the sun moves as steadily, and the seasons roll as surely, and all the successions of nature follow each other with as undisturbed regularity, as if destined so to abide, and so to persevere even unto eternity.

We know not the theory of ungodly men upon this subject, but their practice speaks most intelligibly what they feel about it. They tread upon this world's surface as firmly, as if the world stood on a secure and everlasting foundation. They prosecute this world's objects as strenuously, as if in the gaining their little portion of it, they gained a value which in exchange would be greater than the value of men's soul's. They toil and calculate and devise for this world's interests, with as intense and undivided earnestness, as if they and the world were never to be separated. In the face of evidence-in the face of experience-in the face of all they know about death, and of all that has been revealed to them about judgment and retribution and the final wreck of the present system of things, do they assign à character of perpetuity to what is seen and sensible around them; nor could they possibly labour more devotedly in the pursuits of time, though they themselves were to continue here for ever, and all things to continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.

Unbelief is not so much a dissent of the mind from any one particular truth or doctrine of revelation, as a darkness of the mind which intercepts a realizing view of all the truths and all the objects that lie spread over the region of spirituality. The clearing away of this darkness renders these objects visible; and it is a variation in the order of their disclosure which forms one chief cause of the varieties of religious experience. Some catch in the first instance a view of the law, scattering, as if from the mouth of a volcano, its menaces and its terrors on all the children of disobedience; and it is not till after a dreary interval of discomposure and distress, that they behold the mantle lifted away from that stronghold into which all of them flee as an escape and a resting place. Others again catch at the outset a milder and a quieter ray from the light of the Sun of Righteousness; and it is not till they have been conducted within the fold of a most sure and ample mediatorship, and from whence they may look tranquilly and at a safe and protected distance on all around them -it is not till then, that they are made to see the hatefulness of sin, and all the dread and all the dignity of God's fiery denunciations against it. These things follow each other by a different succession with different individuals; but certain it is that the most partial glimpse of the smallest portion of the whole territory of faith, is greatly more to be desired, Such is the practical impression of a than the deep and sunken and unallevia-natural man about the life that he lives in ted carnality of him, who is wholly given the world; and all his habits of life and unto things present and things sensible; business are founded upon it. But how and even he, to whom the guilt and dan-different from the revelation of its design ger alone have been unfolded, is far more hopefully conditioned, than he, who, alike insensible to the wrath of God the Judge, and to the beseeching voice of God the Saviour, has taken up with time as his portion and his all; and, living as he lists, lives in the enjoyment of a peace, which, if not broken up ere he dies, a few years will demonstrate to have been indeed a fatal and then irrecoverable de-continuance of the world, is, that the lusion.

The 4th verse of this chapter has been referred to by Peter in his second epistle -wherein he also explains why it is that God does not cut short the present stage of His administration-why it is, that He tolerates so long the succession of one sinful generation after another-why it is, that He sweeps not away such a moral nuisance as our rebellious world, and so have done with it-why it is, for example, that at this very hour we see not the symptoms of dissolving nature, and hear not the trumpet of preparation for the solemnities of the last day, and feel not the heat of melting elements, or the

and purpose as given by the apostles. It is a suspension of the wrath of God against sinners, that space may be allowed for repentance. It is that He, not willing that any should perish, but that all should return, forbears the infliction of His final vengeance till they have got their opportunity. The perverse interpretation which a worldly man puts upon the

world is worthy of all his affections; and that it is his wisdom to rear upon its basis the fabric of his hopes. He misses the altogether different conclusion which should be drawn from it-that this continuance is due to the goodness of God, lengthening out to him and to us all the season of an offered indemnity, and of a proclaimed pardon, and of an inviting gospel with the whole of its privileges and blessings-and so, not knowing that this goodness, instead of rivetting him more to the world should lead him to forsake the love of it for the love of its Maker, does he misunderstand and misapply the bearing of time upon eternity.

What we have already noticed, about | goodness, that we have been spared tc the alternative character of that dispen- this present moment of our history; and sation under which we sit, is strikingly now hear Him in the very language of brought out in the verses before us. Good- His own revelation bid you turn and turn, ness to the innocent, or goodness to the for why will you die. But if you will not deserving, merely displays this attribute draw from the treasures of His forbearin a state of simplicity; but the goodness ance, there is treasure of another kind which remains unquelled and unexhausted that is heaping by every day of your neafter it has been sinned against-theglected salvation, in a storehouse of vengoodness which persists in multiplying geance; and which, on the great day wher upon the transgressor the chances of his God shall ease Him of all His adversaries, recovery, and that in the midst of affront will all be poured forth upon you. And and opposition-the goodness which, loth thus it is, that if you despise the riches of to inflict the retaliating blow, still holds His goodness and forbearance and longout a little longer and a little longer; and, suffering, and suffer not them to lead you with all the means in its power of aveng- to repentance, you will by your hardness ing the insults of disobedience, still ekes and impenitency, treasure up unto yourout the season for its return, and plies it selves wrath against the day of wrath, with all the encouragements of a free and revelation of the righteous judgments pardon and an offered reconciliation-of God. this is the exuberance of goodness, this is Let us therefore, in plain urgency, bid the richness of forbearance and long- you repent; and, untramelled by system, suffering; and it is the very display which set before you, as the apostle does, both God is now making in reference to our the coming wrath and the coming glory : world. And by every year which rolls and tell you that the one is to him who over our heads-by every morning in doeth evil, and that the other is to him who which we find that we have awoke to the doeth well; and we may be sure that light of a new day instead of awakening there is nothing in faith, or in any of its in torment-by every hour and every mysteries, which will supersede the day minute through which the stroke of death of judgment as it is recorded in the pasis suspended, and you still continue a sage here before us. The apostle is not breathing man in the land of gospel calls only describing what would have happenand gospel invitations-is God now justi-ed under the first covenant, but what will fying His goodness towards you. And happen under the second. For though earnest as He is for your return, and heed- justified by faith, we shall be judged by less as you are of all this earnestness, works; and let not the one of these artidoes it call as time moves onward for a cles be so contrasted with the other, as to higher and a higher exertion of forbear- throw a shade either of neglect or insigance on the part of the Divinity, to re-nificance over it. When rightly understrain His past and accumulating wrath, from being discharged on the head of those among whom though God entreats yet no man will turn, and though He stretch out His hand yet no man regardeth. Now if such be the character of God in His relation to man, mark what character it stamps upon man should he remain unsoftened and unimpressed by it. It were offence enough to sin against the authority of a superior; but to sin against his forbearance forms a sore and a fatal aggravation. Thus to turn upon the longsuffering of God and to trample it-thus to pervert the season which He has allotted for repentance, into a season of more secure and presumptuous transgressionthus, upon every delay of vengeance with which He favours us, the more to strengthen ourselves in hard and haughty defiance against Him-this indeed is a highway of guilt, which, if you be not arrested therein, will lead to a sorer judgment and a deadlier consummation. Turn then all of you at the call of repentance, or it is the very highway on which you are treading. It is because He is rich in

stood, they reflect upon each other a mutual lustre, and lend to each other a mutual confirmation. Faith is the high road to repentance. Our acceptance of the righteousness of Christ as our title for an entrance into heaven, is an essential stepping-stone to our own personal righteousness as our preparation for the joys and the exercises of heaven; and if there be a stirring of conscience and an agitation of alarm in any of your hearts, under the sense of your not being what you ought to be-we can do nothing more effectual, than to propose the blood of Christ te your faith, in order that under the transforming and sanctifying influence of such a belief, you both be what you ought and do what you ought.

The great object of the apostle's demon|stration is, that men should make their escape from the penalties of the law, to the hiding-place provided for them in the gospel. And though he here intimates the rewards which it holds out to obedience, and the fearful vengeance which it holds out against transgression-yet he does not intimate that any individual ever earned

the one, or ever secured by his own right- | Jesus Christ to whom this judgment will tousness an exemption from the other. be committed; and the judgment will be His object is to make known to us the according to my gospel,' or the gospel constitution or the economy of God's gov- which the apostle proclaims to his hearers. ernment, that, should any of its subjects The judgment of condemnation will be fulfil all its requisitions, they should be upon those who have withstood its overrewarded; but without saying that they tures; or who, if these overtures had actually did so-or, that, should any of never reached them, have withstood the its subjects fail in those requisitions they instigations of their own conscience, would be punished; but without telling us which ought to have been a law unto whether any or some or all come under them. And the judgment of acquittal will this condemnation. How it was that they be upon those who have obeyed the truth, actually did conduct themselves under or who have rendered obedience unto the this administration, he tells us afterwards faith-those whose persons and whose -when he says of all, both Jews and works are accepted for the sake of a better Gentiles, that they were under sin; and righteousness than their own-those who, that by the deeds of the law no flesh can after they believed, were sealed with the be justified, for that all had sinned and Holy Spirit of promise, and were made come short of the glory of God. the workmanship of God in Christ Jesus, and were created anew unto good works. So that, after the first covenant has been superseded by the second-after man has become dead unto the law and made alive unto Christ-after all its demands have been satisfied, and it has no more power to challenge or to condemn him who truly believes in Jesus, Jesus himself takes up the judgment of him, and tries him on the question whether he is actually a believer; and the deeds done in the body are the evidences of this question, and make it manifest on that day that the faith which he professed was no counterfeit, being fruitful in all those works of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ unto the praise and glory of God.

And yet after all there will be a judgment; and this judgment will proceed upon each individual according to the deeds done in his body; and it is upon those who bring forth fruit with patience, or who maintain a patient continuance in well-doing, that these accents of invitation will descend-" Well done, thou good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord;" and it is also upon those who are contentious and obey not the truth but obey unrighteousness, that the awful bidding away to the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels will be pronounced, by Him who conducts the solemnities of that great occasion. But then, as we read afterwards, it will be

LECTURE VII.

ROMANS ii, 12-29.

"For as many as have sinned without law, shall also perish without law; and as many as have sinned in the law, shall be judged by the law, (for not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be jus tified. For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, hav ing not the law, are a law unto themselves; which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their con science also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another,) in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel. Behold, thou art called a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast of God, and knowest his will, and approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law; and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law. Thou therefore that teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery 7 thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege? thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? for the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written. For circumcision verily profiteth, if thou keep the law; but if thou be a breaker of the law, thy circumcision is made uncircumsion. Therefore, if the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision and shall not uncircumcision, which is by nature, if it fulfil the law, judge thee, who by the letter and circumcision dost transgress the law? For he is not a Jew which is one outwardly neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh: but he is a Jew which is one inwardly: and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God."

V. 12. WITHOUT a written law as the Jews had-they shall perish without being judged by that law. There will be another law to judge them-and, whosoever perishes, it will not be the consequence

of a condemnation brought to bear upon him by a law which he did not know of. They who have sinned in the law, that is in the written law, are they who have sinned under that law-the Jews who will

This is all that needs to be advanced in the way of exposition-and the following is a paraphrase of this passage,

be judged by it. V. 13. There is a term which we may often have to recur toand which we therefore shall explain at present. Some would have it that justifi- For as many as have sinned without cation in the New Testament means the law, shall also perish, not by the conmaking of a man personally just. Con- demnation of that law, but of another ceive a thief, for example, to undergo which they had; and as many as have such a transformation of character as sinned who were under the dispensation that he henceforward is honest in all his of the written law, shall by that law be transactions-this would be making him judged. For, as to the Jews, they are not a just person in the sense which some the hearers of the law who are reckoned choose to assign to the word-it would be just before God: but they are the doers justifying him. We believe it may be of the law only who shall be justified. made out, in almost every place where it And, as to the Gentiles, they having not occurs, that this is not the real meaning the law of Mount Sinai, yet, when by naof the term-that it should be taken, not ture they do the things contained in that in a personal, but in what may be called law, these, though without a written code, a forensic signification-or, that to justify, have a something in its place which to instead of meaning to make just by a them has all the authority of a law. For process of operation upon the character, they show that the matter of the law is means to pronounce or to declare just by written in their hearts-both from their the sentence of a judicial court. This is conscience testifying what is right and called the forensic sense of the term, wrong in their own conduct, and from because a court of justice was anciently their reasonings in which they either accalled a forum; and it is evident that, cuse or vindicate one another. No man here at least, the word must be understood shall be judged by a law known only to forensically-for the doers of the law do others and unknown to himself; but all not need to be made just personally. shall be judged by the light which beThey are already so; and therefore for longed to them, in that day when God them to be justified, is to be declared just shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus by the sentence of him who administers Christ, and agreeably to the gospel which the law. V. 15. There seem here to be I now declare unto you. Behold, thou art two distinct proofs of the Gentiles being called a Jew, and hast a confidence in thy a law unto themselves. The first is from law, and makest a boast of thy peculiar the fact of there being a conscience indi- relationship with God, and thou knowest vidually at work in each bosom, and His will, and canst both distinguish and deponing either to the merit or the de- approve the things which are more excelmerit of actions. The second from the lent-being instructed out of thy law. fact of their accusing or excusing one And, with all this superior advantage, thou another, in the reasonings or disputes lookest upon thyself as a guide of the which took place between man and man. blind, and as a light of them who are in For what is translated thoughts,' may be darkness, and as an instructor of the igrendered into dialectic reasonings, or dis- norant, and as a teacher of babes-seeing putes which one man has with another, that thou hast the whole summary of when a question of right or justice is knowledge and truth which is in the law. started between them. It proves them to But it is not he who heareth, or he who be in possession of a common rule, or knoweth, but he who doeth that shall be standard of judging, or, in other words, justified; and dost thou who teachest anthat a law is actually among them. So other, teach effectually thyself ?—thou true is it, even in its application to the who proclaimest that a man should not Gentiles, that there is a light which light-steal, dost thou steal?—thou who sayest eth every man who cometh into the that a man should not commit adultery, world. V. 22. To commit sacrilege, or to take to our private use, that which is consecrated to God. This is what might very readily be brought home to a Jewish conscience-it being matter of frequent complaint against the Jews, that they offered what was lame and defective in sacrifice. V. 24. This is written for example, in Ezekiel xxxvi. 20, where it is said that the Heathen in mockery said unto the people of Israel when they were carried away captive-"These are the people of the Lord and are gone forth out of His land."

dost thou commit adultery?-thou who abhorrest idols, dost thou rob God of His temple offerings?-thou who makest thy boast of the law, through the breaking of the law dost thou dishonour God? For we have it upon record, that through you the name of God has been blasphemed. For your circumcision, and other outward observances which form the great visible distinction between you and the Gentiles

these are profitable if you keep the whole law; but if you break the law, the keeping of its external ordinances will not raise you above the level of those who

know them not, and practise them not. | humanity, and there, on the review of But, on the other hand, if these latter do their doings in this world, will have such by nature the things which by the light a place and such a portion assigned to of nature they know to be lawful, and so them in the next, as shall be in fullest keep righteousness as far as they are in- harmony with the saying that all the formed of it-though they have not prac- ways of God are in truth and in rightetised the literal and outward ordinances, ousness. they shall be dealt with as if they had kept them. And what is more, they will even have such a superiority, as to sit in judgment over you, who, notwithstanding your written law and your ordinances, are in fact transgressors of the law. For he is not a right Jew who is only one outwardly. Neither is that the circumcision that is regarded by God, which is outwardly in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and the genuine circumcision is that of a heart subject to the spirit of the law, and therefore crucified as to its carnal affections, and not that of a mere outward conformity to its visible observations. And the praise of this real circumcision is not of man, who can judge only according to appearances; but of God, who weigheth the secrets of the spirit, and who can alone judge righteously.'

Let us now pass onward to a few practical observations, founded on the passage which we have attempted to explain.

You can readily enough perceive, how, both with Jews and Christians, there are materials enough for such an examination, as renders them the fit subjects both of a reckoning and of a sentence on the great day of account. But this is not so immediately seen in regard to rude and uninformed Paganism. To be without the pale of a written revelation, is held by many, as tantamount, to being without the pale of all moral and judicial cognizance. And yet, we have many intimations, that the Heathen will also be brought to the bar of the general judgment-that, though perhaps more gently dealt with, yet they will be dealt with as the responsible subjects of God's moral administration-that there is a principle of judgment which reaches even unto them, and upon which it will be a righteous thing for God to pass upon them a condemnatory sentence. Sodom and Gomorrah, we are informed, being to be sisted before the tribunal of that day; and a punishment awarded them, which will only be more tolerable than the vengeance that awaits those, who have sinned in the face of clearer light, and better opportunities. Insomuch, that we know not of any age, however far back it may lie removed in the darkness of antiquity; nor do we know of any wandering tribe, however secluded from all the communications of light and knowledge with the rest of the species-the men of which will not be called before the great tribunal of

It were repeating over here what we have already more than once and on various occasions endeavoured to argument, did we again enter upon the question, How this can be? The Heathen will not be judged by the written law of Judaism, neither will they be judged out of the things that are written in the Scriptures of Christianity. God will not, in their case, charge them with the guilt of a sin, for that which they were not taught and could not know to be sinful. It is not their helpless ignorance, and it is not the fatality of their birth, and it is not the thick moral envelopment that has settled itself over the face of their country which will condemn them. It will be their sin, and that coupled with the circumstances of their knowing it to be sin, which will condemn them. And we have already remarked in one lecture, that there do exist, even in the remotest tracks of Paganism, such vestiges of light, as, when collected together, form a code or directory of moral conduct-that there are still to be found among them the fragments of a law, which they never follow but with an approving conscience; and never violate but with the check of an opposing remonstrance, that by their own wilfulness and their own obstinacy is overborne-in other words, that they are a law unto themselves, and that their own conscience vests it with an authority, by bearing witness to the rightness and obligation of its requirements-So that, among the secret things which will be brought to light in the great day of revelation, will it be seen, that all the sin for which a Heathen shall be made to suffer, was sin committed in the face of an inward monitor, which warned him through time, and will condemn him at his outset upon eternity.

In another lecture we observed, that what brought the conscience of Paganism palpably out from its hiding place, was the undeniable fact of the charges and the recriminations and the defences, of which the most unenlightened Pagans were capable in their controversies with each other. This capacity of accusing and of excusing proved a sense and a standard of morality to be amongst them. With the feeling of provocation after injury, was there mixed the judgment of a difference between the right and the wrongand even in the rude outcry of savage resentment and the fierce onset of savage warfare, may we detect their perception

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