did the Redeemer die. Such trespasses as those were imputed to him, that they might not be reckoned to their account. May we not well say with the dying pastor, "All through grace?" "All things," says the Apostle, "are of God," who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ. "God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

Such was the provision he made for our salvation while we were in a state of rebellion. And now let us turn to the application of that promise to particular instances. Look at those who have actually received pardon, look at your own case. When the message of love first reached your ears, did it at once sink down into your heart? Did you that moment lay down the weapons of your rebellion and submit yourself to the reign of grace? When you heard that the doors of your Father's house were opened did you immediately return? No!

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you learnt the glad tidings in your earliest childhood, they became familiar to you as household words, and yet they did not touch your heart with the love of Christ. You pitched your tent in the rebels' camp; you lingered in the far country; you courted the friendship of the world; you slighted the convictions of conscience; you denied the rebellion of your heart against God, and perverted the gospel from a message of peace to guilty rebels, into a proclamation that the requirements of God's law were lowered, and that he would accept such an imperfect and polluted service as your fallen nature would enable you to render. And perhaps, all this time you were giving way to some besetting sin, and leaguing with with your sworn enemies, "the world, the flesh, and the devil." Yet still the Spirit of God strove with you, convinced you, instructed you, guided you, forbore with you, till you were brought at last to see your folly,

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to confess your sin, and to embrace with a willing mind the offer of a free pardon.

Such are "the riches of God's grace" in pardoning sin; but let us next observe how this grace has "abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence." This wisdom is manifested in the suitableness of the plan of redemption to accomplish two great ends the glory of God and the sanctification of man. The glory of God is most illustriously displayed in the means whereby the sinner is redeemed and the rebel pardoned. It may seem at first sight to some, that the proclamation of a free pardon to be immediately obtained is inconsistent with God's justice and truth, and calculated to impress the sinner's mind with the idea that God cannot hate the sin which he so readily pardoned. But look at the cross of Christ. behold a sin-hating and sin-avenging God dealing with sinners in the person of his own dear Son. He loves him with an in

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finite love, but when he stands in the place of sinners he cannot spare him. Justice has her perfect work, and God's hatred to sin is more conspicuously displayed than if every rebel that he pardons were punished with everlasting destruction." Thus the cross of Christ displays the wisdom of God in contriving a plan whereby he may at the same time save the souls of men and his own glory.

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Mercy and truth meet together, righteousness and peace kiss each other." God can be at the same time "just and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus." "If we confess our sins, he is"-not only merciful and gracious, but "faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." And now mark how the other great end is accomplished-the sanctification of man. pardon of sin alone would be a useless boon. Sin is its own punishment, and would be the eternal torment of every sinner, if there was no holy God to call him

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to account.

He must then be weaned from the love of sin and freed from its power, or he cannot be delivered from its punishment. And thus also is "Christ the wisdom of God;" for what so calculated to destroy the love of sin as the love of that Saviour who died for sinners? Is repentance alike necessary to the glory of God and the salvation of men? "They shall look unto me whom they have pierced, and mourn.' Is love the fulfilling of the law? "We love God because he first loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." And, "Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another." Under the influences of the Spirit of truth, the redeemed sinner who looks for a free pardon through the blood of the cross, learns to mourn for the sin that shed it, and to love the Saviour by whom it was shed. He "counts the time past of his life sufficient to have wrought the will of men"-" henceforth," he determines to "live no longer to the lusts of