should be retained in the book of God's remembrance, as a
ground of procedure against liim in the hist day Thus
will every true penitent come to God : and plunge, as it were, into the fountain of the Redeemer's blood, " the fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness " ]
2. His pleas —
[Though David had, till the time of his grievous fall, served God with a more than ordinary degree of zeal and piety, he makes no mention of any past merits, nor does he found his hope on any future purposes. He relies only on the free and sovereign grace of God, as displayed towards sinners in the gift of his only dear Son : and to that he looks, as the ground and measure of the blessings he implores. This is the view which every true penitent must have. He should see that God is of his own nature inclined to mercy''; and that all which Christ has done for us is the fruit of the Father's love*'. Such are the pleas which God approves ; and such will surely prevail in the court of Heaven.]
But, view the penitent. farther, II. In the daily habit of his mind —
Repentance is not a mere occasional expression of the mind, but a state or habit that is fixed and abid- ing in the soul. The true penitent, wherever he goes, carries with him,
1 . A sense of guilt —
[" His sin is ever before him :" indeed, he wishes it to be so : he desires to be humbled under a sense of it : and though he longs to have his transgressions blotted out of God's book, he would never have them effaced from his memory ; or cease, if he could help it, to have as deep an impression of their odiousness and malignity, as if they had been but recently
committed To his latest hour he would " walk softly"
before God, in the remembrance of them.]
2. A sense of shame —
[He is ashamed when he reflects on his conduct through- out the whole of his life ; yea, " he blushes and is confounded before God"^," and even lothes and abhors himself in dust and ashes'^." Nor does a sense of God's pardoning love produce any difference ; except, indeed, as enhancing the lothesome- ness of his character in his own eyes^." The name which, in sincerity of heart, he acknowledges as most appropriate to him, is that which the Apostle Paul assumed, " The chief of sinners."]
^ Exod. xxxiv. 6, 7. " Johniii. 16. Eph. ii. 4, 5. Tit. iii. 4, 5. ^ Ezra ix. 6. ^ job xlii. 6, ^ Ezek. xxxvi. 31. and xvi. G3.
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