But we are sinners--sinners by nature as well as practice; polluted; unholy; so unclean that our emblem is that hideous form which, from the crown of the head to the soles of the feet, is wounds and bruises and putrifying sores; and the news that God cherishes good will to such guilty creatures may well evoke the old, wondering cry, Hear, O heavens; be astonished, O earth! On recalling the happy days of early life, when, a child, he lay in his father's arms; a boy, he sat on his knee; a youth, he walked by his side--the tears that at parting streamed over the old man's cheeks--his kind counsels, his tender warnings, his warm kisses, and how he had stood and watched his departing steps till the brow of a hill or a turn of the road hid him from view, the poor prodigal ventured to hope that his father would not turn him from his door; for the sake of the past and of his mother in the grave, would grant him at least a servant's place. Weighed down by a sense of guilt, his hopes rose to no higher flight--expected nothing beyond a menial's office. To be received with open arms, to be welcomed back again like some youth who has gone abroad to win a fortune or be crowned with laurels--that his should be the fairest robe, the finest ring, the fatted calf--that instead of stealing in under the cloud of night to be concealed from strangers' eyes, the old house on his return should ring to the sound of music, and floors should shake to the dancers' feet, and the whole neighbourhood should be called to rejoice with a father whose shame and sorrow he had been, was a turn of fortune he never dreamt of; never dared to hope for. On the part of that loving, forgiving father, what amazing good will! But how much more amazing this which God proclaimed by the lips of angels, and proved by the death of His beloved Son!
I have known fathers and mothers who were sorely tried by wayward, wicked children--I have seen their gray hairs go down with sorrow to the grave. With hearts bleeding under wounds from the hands of one they loved, I have seen them welcome the grave; saying as they descended into its quiet rest, "the days of my mourning are ended." It is a horrid crime to wring tears from such eyes, to crush such hearts: but was ever patient, hoping, loving parent tried as we have tried our Father in heaven? Not without reason does He ask, "If I be a father, where is mine honour? if I be a master, where is my fear?" And who that thinks of his sins, their guilt, their number, and, as committed against infinite love and tender mercy, their unspeakable atrocity, but will acknowledge the truth of these words, "Because I am God, and not man, therefore the children of men are not consumed"--just as it is because the ship rides by a cable, and not a cobweb, that, when sails are rent, and yards are gone, and breakers are foaming on the reef, she mounts the billows and survives the storm. That we are not suffering the pains of hell, that we have hopes of heaven and ever shall be there, we owe not to our good works, but to God's good will; to that only. Till converted, man does not desire this good will; and never deserves it. We have no claim to it whatever. It is "not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy God saves us, by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost"--therefore His good will has no root in any good works of ours. A sacred mystery, we may apply to it the words which Job, contemplating the grand mysteries of nature, applied to our earth when, seeing this great globe floating in ethereal space, sustained by no pillars, nor suspended by any chain that linked it to the skies, he said, Thou hast hung it upon nothing!