But the whole difficulty is met in God’s great plan of redemption, as revealed in those wonderful words, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.’ The forgiveness resulting from the great act of redemption is exactly what we want, a legal and judicial remission of a legal and judicial sentence. The sentence of the law has been as fully carried out in the person of our most Blessed Redeemer as it would have been had the whole race been cast into hell for ever. The whole difficulty is removed by the principle of substitution, or satisfaction. If Christ was made a curse for us, then the curse is gone from us, and we are free. The holiness of the law is honoured, the righteousness of the lawgiver is preserved, the sentence of the judge is established, not one jot or one tittle of the law is allowed to pass; but, notwithstanding all, the man that has broken it, although he has broken it, is absolutely free. Thus, in Rom. iii. 26, we are taught that the result of propitiation is, ‘That God might be just, and yet the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.’ Here, therefore, we have what I have termed a judicial forgiveness, a forgiveness in perfect harmony with the strict righteousness of law; a forgiveness which is, in fact, the letting forth of God’s eternal love when all legal claims are satisfied. Till that redeeming act was complete, the love was as it were pent up, and could not, in consistency with His own law, flow forth to a condemned people. But all is different now. The law itself pronounces in favour of the condemned, and the result is that God is not only faithful, but just to forgive. And to this righteous forgiveness we may apply the text, ‘In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace.’ * * * * * II. Parental Forgiveness. But when we are in the enjoyment of this judicial forgiveness it may be said, ‘If this be the case, why should we any more pray for forgiveness? Why should we say the Lord’s prayer? Are we not taught that we already have forgiveness as we have redemption through His blood? To answer this question we must mark the distinction between judicial and parental forgiveness.