In pardoning the sin, and in justifying the sinner, the penalty incurred and the obedience demanded must be met. The law must be honored, justice satisfied, holiness secured, and the righteousness, dignity, and glory of the moral Government of God displayed and magnified in the eyes of the whole universe. Let an ingenuous and thoughtful mind pause and enquire how could God exhibit His infinite abhorrence of sin, and vindicate the holiness of the law; how exact the stern penalty incurred by the one, and meet the unbending requirements of the other- by saving the sinner on the sole basis of Mercy alone? Impossible!
But, behold the plan! The Son of God, by His sinless obedience, has met all the precepts of the Law, magnifying and making it honorable, -the Law Giver thus becoming the Law Fulfiller, and by His sacrificial death has answered all the demands of justice, satisfying its every claim, and paying every farthing of the debt; and now the glory of God appears infinitely greater in the salvation of one sinner than it could have appeared in the eternal destruction of every being of the human race!
Oh what imagination can fully conceive, or language adequately describe, the glory which accrues to God from the Atonement and Sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is our hope! Countless worlds, plunged eternally into hell, could never have so exhibited God’s holiness and justice and truth, or have presented such a perfect display of His glory before angels, men, and devils, as the sacrifice of His beloved Son upon the cross of Calvary. “I have glorified You on the earth: I have finished the work which You gave me to do.”
octavius winslow