Now, if we consider redemption in its full and complete sense of actual deliverance through the precious blood of the Lamb, it is perfectly clear that none but the elect of God are included in the blessing. As a matter of fact the rest are not delivered. According to St. John, the whole world lieth in wickedness, and if it is still lying in wickedness in no sense whatever can it be said to be delivered. None but the chosen people of God can ever say, ‘Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son.’ Col. i. 13. As for the rest they do not profess to be delivered. Some do not even wish for the great deliverance; some, though they may feel a certain languid wish for it, never in earnest seek for it; and others, if they do seek, seek in a wrong way, and so never find. The result is, that practically they are not delivered. Thus we all acknowledge a particular, or limited, deliverance. We none believe that all are saved; and we must believe that the Lord Jesus actually delivers those only who are His own, those whom He describes in the words, ‘The men which thou gavest me out of the world.’ But suppose we take redemption in the sense in which it is perpetually employed in religious books, viz., as meaning the same as atonement, there arises another question of incalculable importance which demands our most attentive consideration. Is the atonement limited as well as the deliverance? It is perfectly clear that none are delivered but God’s chosen people. They, and they only, are plucked as brands from the burning, and eternally saved. According to the 17th Article, God ‘hath constantly decreed by His counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those whom He hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to everlasting salvation, as vessels made to honour.’ But is nothing done for the remainder? In other words, did the substitution of the Lord Jesus Christ extend to the whole world, or did it not? Was atonement made for all mankind in that marvellous act of mercy, or were the great majority left out altogether most miserably to perish, without any hope of deliverance, and without the possibility of being saved in the Lord Jesus? It is impossible to imagine a question of more urgent importance to all those who are anxious about their souls.