[.5.] From hence in his name there is proclaimed redemption to the captives, freedom to poor prisoners that were in debt, and weak, and could not acquit themselves. And therefore the publication of the gospel is compared to the year of jubilee : Luke iv. 19, Christ came ' to preach the acceptable year of the Lord/ It relates to the year of jubilee, wherein all debts were cancelled ; it was a year of general releasement, proclaimed by sound of trumpet, that every man should return to his inheritance, and all debts dissolved and done away : Lev. XXV. 9, 10. So Jesus Christ saith, ' The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord ; ' that is, to proclaim to poor captives a release of all debts, and all bonds which are upon them.
[6.] All those that come to God by Christ are interested in the comfort of this offer and proclamation of grace, and may plead with God about their discharge from this great and heavy debt. I put " it mainly in that notion (those that come to God by Christ), because you will find that is the description of those whom Christ means to save : Heb. vii. 25, ' He is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him.' Who are those that come unto God by him ? Those that in Christ's name do seriously, and with brokenness of heart, deal with him about a release and a discharge. To come to God by him, it is to come in his name, to plead his propitiation, or his satisfaction, as the only meritorious cause ; and the promise of God in Christ to blot out our offences, as the only ground of hope ; and as to ourselves, acknowledging the debt; that is, in confessing our sins, and our desert of punishment, with a purpose to forsake them.
174 AN EXPOSITION OF [MaT. VI. 12.
(1.) There is required an acknowledgment of the debt. God stands upon it, that his justice may be owned with a due sense, according to the tenor of the first covenant : for though the satisfaction be made by another, and that by a surety of God's providing ; yet God will have the creature know they are under so heavy a debt, that he will have them feel it in brokenness of heart; not know it only in a general conviction, but confess their sins : 1 John i. 9, ' If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.' When we come with true remorse, and confess we have offended so just, so holy, so merciful a Father, it must be grievous to us in the remembrance of it. You must not only confess sin as a wu'ong, but as a debt : sin hath wronged God, and it is also a debt binding you over to a punish- ment we could never endure, nor make God any satisfaction for. Therefore David, when he would have God's bond crossed and can- celled, see how he pleads : Ps. li. 2, 3, ' 0 Lord, blot out mine offences, for I acknowledge my transgressions ; and my sin is ever be- fore me.' Blot it out, for I acknowledge it ; that is, I submit to thy instituted course ; I submit to the justice of the first covenant.
(2.) The satisfaction of Christ must be pleaded also by a sinner in the court of heaven, in a believing manner, that there may be an owning of the surety. All parties that are interested in this business must consent. Now God and Christ they are agreed about the business of salvation : God hath agreed to take satisfaction from Christ, and Christ hath agreed to make this satisfaction to God : all the business now is about the sinner's consent, or about his ready acceptation of Jesus Christ ; and we never heartily indeed consent to this, that Christ shall be our surety, and he the person that must release and discharge this debt, until we look upon him by an eye of faith, as one that tore the bond and handwriting that was against us. The law is called ' the handwriting that was against us; ' there is the bond which was to be put in suit : now, Col. ii. 14, He hath torn, or ' blotted out the handwriting of ordinances, that was against us, which was con- trary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.' He hath disannulled the law, which binds to suffer the wrath of God. The law was the bond by which our death was ratified.
(3.) There is required an unfeigned purpose to forsake sin. He that hath been released of his debt, must not still run into new arrears.
Christ never blotted out our debts that we might renew them, and go on upon a new score of offending God again ; this is to dally with God, to run into the snare when he hath broken it for us and given us an escape, to plunge ourselves into new debts again.
In this prayer, ' Forgive us our debts,' then presently, ' Lead us not into temptation.' Therefore we must purpose to forsake sin, other- wise we do not draw nigh to God with a true heart : Heb. x. 22. We do but deal falsely with God in all the confessions we make, and in all the pleas of faith, unless there be an unfeigned purpose to renounce all sin, and cast it off as a thing that wiU undo our souls. ^ Thus, Christians, must you sue out your release and discharge in your surety's name.