[February 22d, 1863.]
The object of God’s love. The greatness of that love. The design of God in its manifestation.
I. The object of God’s love.
Man, in distinction from all other orders of beings. This determines nothing more. It does not teach that benevolence merely was the motive of the act here spoken of. Nor does it assert that philanthropy, or indiscriminate or equal love for all mankind was the form of the love here spoken of. This may be true. The passage is consistent also with the assumption that it was the distinguishing or peculiar love to his people. Which is the real or true view of the matter depends on the analogy of Scripture. When it is said that Christ is the Saviour of the world, the Saviour of men, that is consistent with the doctrine that he does not save all men, or that he saves only his people. In either case he is the Saviour of men.
Man being considered as the object of God’s love, there are considerations which enhance the character of that love. 1. The insignificance of man, absolutely and relatively. What is man in the immensity of God’s works, and what is he in comparison with the higher order of intelligences? 2. His guilt. He is not himself the proper object of love or recipient of favors. He deserves nothing but the wrath and curse of God. 3. He is unattractive. In the highest degree repulsive and unlovely.
That God therefore should love man is wonderful and mysterious. It is unaccountable. It is something for which no reason can be given. It is, therefore, something hard to be believed. Hard, not for the impenitent and insensible, but for the enlightened and convinced sinner. It needs, therefore, not only the repeated assurances and assertions of the Scriptures, but also the clearest manifestation, and even this is not enough. It requires the special revelation and witnessing of the Holy Spirit that we are the objects of the love of God.
II. The greatness of the love of God—of God as manifested in the gift of Christ. We must take the doctrines of the Bible as they are presented, and hold them in the form in which they are presented. We must not, on the plea that God is an infinite Being, and that the truth is presented in human forms, i.e., in forms adapted to our mode of conception, explain them away, or expand them into more general philosophical formulas. Whether we can comprehend them or not, we must receive, believe and live upon them as revealed. It is declared in the Scriptures:1. That there is only one God. 2. That there are three distinct persons in the Godhead, and that the Son, or second person, is the object of the infinite love of the Father. 3. That something is true of the Son that is not true of the Father or the Spirit. It was the Son, and neither of the other persons of the trinity, who became incarnate and suffered and died for our sins. 4. That this involved a great sacrifice on the part of the Father; not a painful one, but involved something which love to the Son would, if allowed exclusive control, have prevented. The person given up to humiliation, suffering and death was the Son of God: not in the sense in which angels and men are called the sons of God, but his only begotten Son, the partaker of his nature, the same in substance and equal in power and glory with the Father.
The importance of the object to be obtained or the strength of the feeling which prompts to its attainment, is to be measured by the means adapted to that end. To give up an angel, or a world, or a myriad of worlds, would indicate that the feeling was strong and the object of vast importance. But to give up his Son places these things beyond our comprehension. It shows the love to be absolutely infinite—such as admits of no limit or measure.
III. The design of God in giving his Son was that men should not perish but have everlasting life. The perdition to which they were exposed included eternal misery and eternal sinfulness. The salvation includes deliverance from that perdition, and eternal holiness and eternal blessedness.
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It is here, as well as elsewhere taught, that it was the design of God to render the salvation of all men possible, by the gift of his Son. There was nothing in the nature, or the value, or the design of his work to render it available for any one class of men only. Whosoever believeth, etc. This is not inconsistent with other representations that it entered into God’s design to render the salvation of his people certain by the death of his Son.
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The passage teaches that faith is the only condition of salvation; not descent from Abraham, nor circumcision, not church connection, not outward rite, not goodness, but simple faith, which indeed secures all goodness, etc.
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It teaches that faith includes trust. We believe upon Christ, i.e., we trust in him as our Saviour. This includes or supposes the apprehension of his glory as the Son of God; the renunciation of all other grounds of reliance; the knowledge of what he has done and has promised to do for our salvation, and the actual committing ourselves into his hands believing that he will save us.
This is a passage to which we must constantly recur for our own instruction, confirmation and consolation, and for the instruction and guidance of those committed to our care.
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