Bible. Luke II, 14 -- Meditations; Christmas sermons
Christ's imputed righteousness is bestowed equally on all
believers--none, the least any more than the greatest sinner, being
more justified than another. Feeling assured or not of their
salvation, all His are equally safe--"those whom Thou hast given me I
have kept, and none of them are lost." There is no such equal
enjoyment among believers of peace in believing; some walking all
their days under a cloud, and some who walk in darkness and have no
light, only reaching heaven, like a blind man guided homewards by the
hand of his child, by their hold of the promise, Who is he that
feareth the Lord and obeyeth the voice of His servant, that walketh
in darkness and hath no light; let him trust in the name of the Lord,
and stay himself in his God. But where there is peace springing from a
sense of forgiveness, of all the fruits of the Spirit that grow in
Christ's fair garden, this is sweetest. Among the blessings enjoyed on
earth, it has no superior, or rival even. It passeth understanding,
says an apostle. Nor did David regard any as happy but those who
enjoyed it--pronouncing "blessed," not the great, or rich, or noble,
or famous, but "the man," whatever his condition, "whose transgression
is forgiven, whose sin is covered." And so he might. With this peace
the believer regards death as the gate of life: enters the grave as a
quiet anchorage from seas and storms; and looks forward to the scene
of final judgment as a prince to his coronation, or a happy bride to
her marriage day. A sense of forgiveness lays the sick head on a
pillow softer than downs; lightens sorrow's heaviest burdens; makes
poverty rich beyond the wealth of banks; spoils death of his sting;
arms the child of God against the ills of life; and, lifting him up
above its trials, makes him like some lofty mountain, at whose feet
the lake may be lashed into foaming billows, and adown whose seamed
and rugged sides clouds may fall in gloomy folds, but whose head,
shooting up into the calm blue heavens, reposes in unbroken peace,
rejoices in perpetual sunshine.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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