“The Father's
essential goodness is a powerful persuasion to rely on the promise in Christ
for pardon.
Let him take hold
of my strength, that he may take peace with me Isaiah 27:5. And where is God's
saving strength but in Christ? The Father has laid strength upon His Mighty One
who is "able also to save them to the uttermost that come into God by
him" Hebrews 7:25. Do not let natural reasoning mislead you-- it is not
God's absolute power or mercy that will help you, but His covenant strength and
mercy in Christ. Take hold of Christ and you hold God's arm.
Indeed, the
Father's essential goodness is a powerful persuasion to rely on the promise in
Christ for pardon, when the person considers that God's very nature is
forgiving and merciful. But if there were no promise to apply this mercy to
sinners through Christ, the fact of God's goodness would be only cold comfort.
After all, He could have damned the whole stock of Adam and not impaired His
goodness in the least.
It is certainly no
blot to the almightiness of God's power that He does not do everything in the
spectrum of His divine ability. He could make more worlds if He wanted to; but
He is no less powerful because He does not. And He could have saved the fallen
angels with the sons of lost man had He thought such a design was fitting. But,
having brought forth no promise for such a thing, the essential goodness of God
affords the devils little hope that He will do it.
Yet God's goodness
continues. Those who, out of simple ignorance of the Gospel or proud reasoning
away from it, reject God's way of making peace through Christ's satisfaction
and then depend on God's absolute mercy and goodness at the last day will, it
seems, find as little benefit from this Christless mercy as the devils
themselves have found. And their final destination will only confirm the
futility of neglecting such a great salvation through the blood of God's Son.
Quoted material from, ”The Christian in Complete
Armour Daily Readings in Spiritual Warfare” by Gurnall and James S Bell.
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