The text goes yet further, and shews that, II. There is in us nothing which is not a ground rather for shame and confusion —
Doubtless the Jews were a peculiarly " stiff-necked people :" yet, if we have not the same sins to deplore, we have enough to justify the application of this pas- sage to ourselves.
The sins of our unregenerate state may well fill us with confusion —
a Luke xvii. 10. b Isai. lxiv. 6.
c Rom. iii. 27. See also Ezek. xxxvi. 21—23.
d Matt. xxi. 31. e Deut. vii. 6 — 8. and ix. 4 — 6.
[Time may efface many things from our remembrance; but it cannot alter the nature of them, or blot them out of the book of God. Our sins are all in his sight, as if they were transacted but yesterday : and whatever degree of malignity they had formerly, that they retain at this moment : and con- sequently we should feel on their account all the shame, and sorrow, and confusion that they either did occasion, or ought to have occasioned, at the time they were committed. Yea, the whole mass of evil that ever passed through our minds ought to lie with a weight upon our consciences, so far at least as to produce an abiding sense of our extreme sinfulness.]
The infirmities of our regenerate state also should humble us in the dust before God —
[Who is not conscious of innumerable evils working in his heart? Who does not at some time feel the workings of pride, anger, worldliness, impurity, and various other corrup- tions ? Who does not feel that these are properly " his own ivays" and that the exercise of contrary dispositions is the fruit of divine grace ?
But let us take the best actions of our lives, and the holiest dispositions of our hearts : what are our prayers and our praises, when compared with the importance of the blessings we have received, or that we desire at God's hands ? What is our repentance, when compared with the number and heinous- ness of our transgressions ? What is our trust in God ? What our love to the blessed Saviour? What our zeal in his ser- vice ? Do they bear any proportion to the occasions that call for them ? We know that a godly person would be utterly ashamed of such services as a mere formalist makes the ground of his boast and confidence : and would not a perfect Being, if sent down to serve his God on earth, lothe himself, if he were to render no better services than ours ? Surely then we ought to blush and be confounded before God, not only for the remains of evil that are within us, but for the very best actions we have ever performed.]
The emphatic manner in which these things are delivered, leads us to notice,
III. The importance of being reminded of these things, and of having them deeply fixed in our hearts —
We are apt to take credit to ourselves, and to think ourselves as high in God's estimation as we are in our own. But God would have us know, that there