Zech. xii. 10. I ivill pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of sup- plications : and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his first-born.
REPENTANCE is a subject, with which every one supposes himself to be sufficiently acquainted, but
which is indeed very rarely understood. The Scrip- tures speak of a repentance unto salvation, not to be repented ofa; intimating thereby, that there is a repentance, which is not unto salvation ; and which therefore itself needs to be repented of. The text in this view deserves our deepest attention, since it opens to us, I. The nature of evangelical repentance —
The sorrow, produced in the heart of a true peni- tent, is exceeding deep —
[Nothing can be more pungent than the grief of a parent who has lost " his first-born," " his only sonb." Yet to that is the mourning of a penitent twice compared. In either case, the soul is bowed down greatly ; it is indisposed for receiving gratifications from those vanities, with which it was before amused ; and loves to indulge in pensive solitude, and painful reflections. The parent's anguish indeed may be softened by the assiduities of surviving friends ; and may wholly lose its pungency through the lapse of time. But nothing can mitigate the pangs of a wounded spirit, nothing silence the accusations of a guilty conscience, till " the balm of Gilead," the blood of Jesus, be applied to it : nor even then will sin ever cease to be the grief and burthen of the soulc.]
But repentance is then only to be called evange- lical, when it has immediate respect to Christ —
[Twice is it said in the text, that men shall mourn "for him" that is, for Christ d. Not that the miseries, which Christ endured on the cross, are the proper grounds of a penitent's sorrow ; but rather, it is his grief that he has so dishonoured Christ by his sins, and that he has yet again and again " cru- cified him afresh" by continuing in sin. Many, who are not really humbled, are concerned for their sins as having subjected them to God's displeasure e; but it is the true penitent alone, who mourns for sin, as dishonouring Christ, and as counter- acting all the gracious purposes of his love.]
This will more fully appear by considering, II. The means by which it is to be attained —
The effusion of the Spirit is the primary means of producing penitence in our hearts —
[The Holy Spirit is called " the Spirit of grace and of supplication," because he is the Author and Giver of all grace,
a 2 Cor. vii. 10. b Luke vii. 12. c Ezek. xvi. G3.
d Comp. John xix. 37. e Exod. x. 16, 17. 1 Kings xxi. 29.