On Thy Warnings
“And that -will “by no means clear the guilty.” — Ezon-cs xxxiv. 7.
“He is faithful that promised. Do we bear sufficiently in mind another equal fidelity — “He is faithful” that threatened f My soul! ponder that solemn word, “who will h/ no means clear!” Remember when that word was spoken: it was in connection with a sublime apocalypse of God’s majesty. It was as “the ’ glory’ of the Lord” was passing before Moses! Was not this intended to show that there is an awful and inseparable connection between the Divine glory and the impossibility of God’s clearing the guilty? It was at a time, moreover, when the henignity of God was intended to be more specially manifested.
It was when He was declared to be “the Lord, the Lord God, merciful, gracious, long-suffering, abundant in goodness.” Then it was, we listen to the awful note of warning, that “clear the guilty” He will not, and cannot! His law requires — the honor of His throne requires — demands — that the guilty be ‘-’-not cleared.”
Reader! art thou still clinging to the dream of final mercy? Dost thou believe in the first part of the Divine proclamation at Sinai, and persist in presumptuous and fatal skepticism with regard to the last? — that, boundless in His resources, and infinite in His love, God will by some means “clear the guilty?”
Be not deceived! See that ye do not incur the woe of him who “striveth with his Maker!” The Lord, who ‘’is not slack concerning His promises,” can be as little slack concerning His threatenings. Time blunts the wrath of man, and chastens and subdues the turbulence of his passions; but there is no blind impulse — no vacillation in Him with
whom “a thousand years are as one day.” “God’s threatenings,” says a writer, “are God’s doings!” The law has not one breathing of mercy for you. There is not one cleft in all Mount Sinai where you can escape the vengeance of the storm! Unless you flee without delay to Him who has “cleared the guilty” by Himself — the Guiltless — becoming the guilt-bearer, be assm-ed that through eternity “you will by no means be cleared.”
My soul! art thou yet in this state of perilous estrangement? still launched on the cheerless ocean of uncertainty, leaving everything to a dying hour, the time to which nothing should be left, hut to die! Ponder these living words of unchanging truth — “Though hand join in hand, the wicked shall not escape unpunished.” The golden chain of grace stretches from heaven to earth, but it can go no further — “Seek ye the Lord while He may be found.” “While P’’ There is solemn warning in that one word! It tells thee there is a day coming, when the Lord, will be sought, but will not be “found.”
‘Time’s sun is fast setting — its twilight is nigh — Its evening is falling in cloud o’er the sky; Its shadows are stretching in ominous gloom. Its midnight approaches — the midnight of doom! Then haste, sinner, haste, there is mercy for thee, And wrath is preparing — flee, lingerer, flee!”
Reader! cast thyself this night at His footstool; implore His mercy. Rise not from thy bended knees, until, with His propitiated smile gladdening thee, and the hope of His heaven cheering thee, thou mayest (it may be for the first time in thy life) lie down with a quiet conscience and a pardoned soul, on thy nightly couch, exclaiming —
“I WILL BOTH LAY ME DOWN IN PEACE AND SLEEP; FOR THOU. LOED, ONLY MAKEST ME DWELL IN SAFETY!”