[This seems no less unsearchable than the former. Sup- posing that God had sent his Son to expiate our guilt, we should at least expect that he would require man to work out a righteousness for himself, and to obtain salvation by his obedience to the law. But, blessed be his name ! he has not required any such thing. He requires men indeed to be righteous, and to obey his law : nor will he save any man who does not in these respects endeavour to fulful his will. But he does not require man to fulfil his law, in order to work out a righteousness whereby he may be justified: on the contrary, he requires men to renounce all dependence on their own righteousness, and to seek for acceptance solely through the righteousness of Christ. A perfect righteousness of our own we could not have : and therefore God sent his own Son to obev the precepts of the law, as well as to suffer its penalties, and' by his own obedience unto death, to " bring in an everlast- ing righteousness," " which should be unto all, and upon all, them that believe." Thus the vilest sinner in the universe, the very instant he truly believes in Christ, becomes possessed of a righteousness commensurate with the utmost demands of God's perfect law, a righteousness in which he stands before God without spot or blemish. How wonderful is this ! how inconceivable to any finite capacity, that God should, I had almost said that God could, appoint such a way for the resto- ration and salvation of fallen man !]
3. His bringing out of man's fall more glory to himself, and more good to man, than if man had never fallen —
[The dishonour done to God by the fall of man was beyond all conception great: yet is the honour done to him by man's recovery infinitely greater. True it is, God would have been equally glorious in himself, if man had never been restored : but his perfections would never have been so dis- played in the sight of his creatures. It would never have been known that mercy constituted any part of his character; whilst it is, in reality, that perfection in which he most de- lights. Nor would his justice have appeared so awful in the destruction of the whole human race, as it appears in inflicting death upon his only dear Son, when standing in the place of sinners. But suppose that mercy might have been exercised towards sinners in some other way ; how could justice have borne any part in their salvation ? But now justice is as much engaged on the side of a believing penitent as mercy itself; and the penitent, whilst he entreats God to be merciful to himself, may entreat him also to be just to his Beloved Son, who paid the full price for his redemption : yes, he may hope in the very justice of God, who is " a just God and a Saviotir,"
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and can be "just, and yet the justifier of all them that believe." What an inscrutable mystery is here !
But we must notice also the good that accrues to man. Suppose man had never fallen, he would have had but a creature's righteousness, and consequently a reward only pro- portioned to it : but now the believer has the righteousness of the Creator himself, even the Lord Jesus Christ, who is " made righteousness unto us," and is therefore " called, The Lord our Righteousness." I may add too, that the believer is actually more safe than Adam was in Paradise. Adam had his own safety, and that of all his posterity, committed into his hands : and what the event was, we know by bitter experience. But God has now committed his chosen people to the hands of his own Son, that he may redeem them by his blood, sanctify them by his Spirit, and " preserve them blameless unto his heavenly kingdom." Now Jesus himself tells us, that " of those who were given him, he lost none," nor ever would lose one; for that "none ever could, or ever should, pluck them out of his hands." The Father has no longer trusted us, so to speak, with our own destinies : he has treasured up our life and strength in Christ Jesus : " our life is hid with Christ in God :" and because Christ himself is our life, we, at his appearing, shall appear with him in glory."