III.

SIN PUNISHED, THOUGH FORGIVEN.

Be not deceived; God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap.-Galatians vi. 7.

But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die; all his transgressions that he hath committed they shall not be mentioned unto him; in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live.—Ezekiel xviii. 21, 22.

THE Bible often gives us seemingly conflicting views of truth. One of its great merits is that it does not sacrifice truth of any sort merely in order to preserve consistency. God's prophets are content to utter strange and discordant sayings about those awful problems which are at the root of all religion; e.g. we find the doctrines of free-will and necessity both in the Bible—a plain statement of man's moral freedom, and an equally plain statement of the absolute moral incapacity of man without Divine grace. On this high and awful subject the sacred writers seem to have realised the fact, that both doctrines are necessary for

a full statement of facts; and that in the case of mankind, neither freedom nor dependence on Divine grace has its real significance duly apprehended, when taken alone and apart from that other doctrine which seems contradictory. As St. Bernard justly says: "If you take away grace there is no means of salvation; if you take away freedom there is nothing to be saved"-i.e. no real moral agent.

And so, too, with regard to the universal punishment of sin and the seemingly opposite doctrine of Divine forgiveness. Holy Scripture wisely gives us both sides of the question, and God intends us to learn truth and wisdom from a thoughtful reception. of both these doctrines. Both doctrines are true and both are salutary: it is in a sense true that no sin is ever forgiven by God, and it is in a sense true that all repented sin is always forgiven by God; it is most true that we all reap exactly what we ourselves have sown, and the consolatory declaration of God's prophet, that our repented and forsaken sins shall not even be mentioned unto us, is also most true. Let us endeavour carefully to learn practical wisdom from both these facts.

First, then, in a certain sense, no sin is ever forgiven by God, i.e. God does not undo the past or suspend His great moral law, "Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap." It is fanaticism, and

D

not sober-minded Christianity which promises the penitent perfect freedom henceforth from those moral and spiritual fetters which his past life has been forging for him. Our sins may seem to let us go, but, alas! like Pharoah, they alter their mind, and arise to pursue, overtake, and devour us. Experience, like the voice of Nathan to penitent David, may assure us of God's forgiveness, but it does not assure us of complete immunity from punishment. "The Lord

also hath put away thy sin; howbeit, because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die."

It is for the welfare of mankind at large that there should be an indissoluble connection between sin and suffering, and therefore no penitence on the part of an individual can induce God to relax the sternness of His moral law. There is genuine and earnest love for our race in this law, though, incidentally, it may seem from time to time to bear hardly on individuals. “To Thee, O Lord, belongeth mercy; for Thou renderest to every man according to his works."

Now, it is well for us to realise the full import of that stern law that we must inevitably reap just what we sow, and nothing else. "Fools make a mock at sin," simply because fools do not realise the terrible

woes that sin inevitably brings with it. We are apt to take very superficial views of sin-to regard it too much as an external thing. We are apt to forget that sin is not merely a trespass against God, but also a violation of the fixed laws of our moral and spiritual health. The external effects of sin may be to some extent reckoned up and known; but who can reckon. up or compute its internal consequences? External acts are not sin, but only the manifestation of sin. Sin is something internal-a diseased condition of our moral and spiritual nature. In our inner life our sins always "find us out," though judgment may often seem to linger. David might not build God's house because of the still lingering stains of his past deeds. And so, in truth, it must ever be. There are serene heights of religion to which perhaps in this life none may soar but those whose spirits have never been deeply contaminated by sin.

I much doubt whether the great Augustine, with all his spiritual nobleness, ever succeeded in cleansing God's house aright-ever made his inmost soul that fair temple of the Lord which he would fain have had it. Doubtless, in that most holy house of the Lord, the soul of this His saint, there ever lingered, to his exceeding grief, some of that profane rabble who, in earlier days, had held high revelry in the courts of God's dwelling-place. And thus, too, I doubt not it

was with that strange mixture of good and evil, the cowardly and treacherous, but still grand soul of Jacob. At the close of his life he could say with truth, that his days had been "few and evil." The sins of his youth no doubt possessed him all his days bitter retribution followed externally-but still direr retribution came upon him internally. His spiritual nature was impoverished in this world for ever. Not to his sin-stained soul should be revealed the mysteries of God's nature; he might not know God's great name; not as the pure and unselfish see God might mean Jacob see Him: "To him that hath it shall be given." Jacob's past meanness had dulled the brightness of his moral nature, and made it a less adequate mirror of God than it might otherwise have been; and surely this was punishment enough-to have a quenchless desire to find God, and yet never to find Him in any quite satisfying sense-surely that was sorrow enough.

One of the deepest griefs of our nature arises from committing sins which are the outcome only of a very small part of our character, and which our higher feelings hate and detest. Deep is the sorrow of the merciful man, who is betrayed by his lower nature into cruelty; or of the generous man, who is betrayed into meanness. The very good and the very bad are comparatively free from grief of this