Nor will Christ Jesus miss of his design in proffering of mercy in the first place to the biggest sinners. You know what work the Lord, by laying hold of the woman of Samaria, made among the people there. They knew that she was a town sinner, an adulteress, yea, one that after the most audacious manner lived in uncleanness with a man that was not her husband: but when she, from a turn upon her heart, went into the city, and said to her neighbours, “Come,” Oh how they came! how they flocked out of the city to Jesus Christ! “Then they went out of the city, and came to him.” “And many of the Samaritans (people perhaps as bad as herself) believed on him, for the saying of the woman, which testified, saying, he told me all that ever I did;” John iv. 39.
That word, “He told me all that ever I did,” was a great argument with them; for by that they gathered, that though he knew her to be vile, yet he did not despise her, nor refuse to shew how willing he was to communicate his grace unto her; and this fetched over, first her, then them.
This woman, as I said, was a Samaritan sinner, a sinner of the worst complexion: for the Jews abhorred to have ought to do with them, ver. 9; wherefore none more fit than she to be made one of the decoys of heaven, to bring others of these Samaritan wild-fowls under the net of the grace of Christ. And she did the work to purpose. Many, and many more of the Samaritans believed on him; ver. 40–42. The heart of man, though set on sin, will, when it comes once to a persuasion that God is willing to have mercy upon us, incline to come to Jesus Christ for life.
Witness those turn-aways from God that you also read of in Jeremiah; for after they had heard three or four times over, that God had mercy for backsliders, they broke out, and said, “Behold, we come unto thee, for thou art the Lord our God.” Or as those in Hosea did, “For in thee the fatherless find mercy;” Jer. iii. 22; Hos. xiv. 1–3.
Mercy, and the revelation thereof, is the only antidote against sin. It is of a thawing nature; it will loose the heart that is frozen up in sin; yea, it will make the unwilling willing to come to Jesus Christ for life. Wherefore, do you think, was it that Jesus Christ told the adulterous woman, and that before so many sinners, that he had not condemned her, but to allure her, with them there present, to hope to find favour at his hands? (As he also saith in another place, “I came not to judge, but to save the world.”) For might they not thence most rationally conclude, that if Jesus Christ had rather save than damn an harlot, there was encouragement for them to come to him for mercy.
I heard once a story from a soldier, who with his company had laid siege against a fort, that so long as the besieged were persuaded their foes would shew them no favour, they fought like madmen; but when they saw one of their fellows taken, and received to favour, they all came tumbling down from their fortress, and delivered themselves into their enemies’ hands.
I am persuaded, did men believe that there is that grace and willingness in the heart of Christ to save sinners, as the word imports there is, they would come tumbling into his arms: but Satan has blinded their minds, that they cannot see this thing. Howbeit, the Lord Jesus has, as I said, that others might take heart and come to him, given out a commandment, that mercy should in the first place be offered to the biggest sinners. “Begin,” saith he, “at Jerusalem.” And thus I end the third reason.
_Fourthly_, Jesus Christ would have mercy offered in the first place to the biggest sinners, because that is the way, if they receive it, most to weaken the kingdom of Satan, and to keep it lowest in every age of the world. The biggest sinners, they are Satan’s colonels and captains, the leaders of his people, and they that most stoutly make head against the Son of God. Wherefore let these first be conquered, and his kingdom will be weak. When Ishbosheth had lost his Abner, his kingdom was made weak: nor did he sit but tottering then upon his throne. So when Satan loseth his strong men, them that are mighty to work iniquity, and dexterous to manage others in the same, then is his kingdom weak; 2 Sam. iii. Therefore, I say, Christ doth offer mercy in the first place to such, the more to weaken his kingdom. Christ Jesus was glad to see Satan fall like lightning from heaven, that is, suddenly or head long; and it was, surely, by casting of him out of strong possessions, and by recovering of some notorious sinners out of his clutches; Luke x. 17–19.