Justice Vindicated And Righteousness Exemplified

Justice Vindicated And Righteousness Exemplified

(No. 3038)

A SERMON PUBLISHED ON THURSDAY, MAY 2, 1907.

DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, EARLY IN THE YEAR 1865.

"Being justified freely by His Grace through the redemption that is in
Christ Jesus; whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith
in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins
that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at
this time His righteousness: that He might be just, and the justifer of
him who believes in Jesus." Romans 3:24-26.

THE death of our Lord Jesus Christ answered many valuable purposes. It
manifested the manifold Wisdom of God. To angels in Heaven and to
saints on earth, God never appeared so infinitely wise as in the
ordaining of the plan of salvation by the substitution of His Son for
guilty sinners. That death also revealed God's amazing love. It
proclaimed to astonished worlds how "God so loved the world, that He
gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not
perish, but have everlasting life." The Atonement of Christ answered
the purpose, moreover, of purifying His people. That He might sanctify
the people by His own blood, He suffered outside the camp. He loved His
Church and gave Himself for it, we know, "that He might present it to
Himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such
thing." The Cross has also been the great battering-ram for breaking
down the middle wall of partition between Jew and Gentile. It is by
Christ's blood that we are made one. "Now therefore you are no more
strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of
the household of God." Caste is abolished and invidious distinctions
are set aside. There is no longer in Christ Jesus barbarian, Scythian,
bond or free, circumcised or uncircumcised, but Christ is All-in-All.
That same atoning Sacrifice also broke down the wall which separated
both Jew and Gentile from God–"that He might reconcile both unto God
in one body by the Cross, having slain the enmity thereby." The
alienation prevailed till the reconciliation was effected by the
precious blood of Jesus. We remain enemies in our minds by wicked works
until we see the great love with which He loved us, and then that love
melts our heart and makes us friends ofGod.

Time would fail me did I attempt to enter into anything like an
enumeration of the blessed purposes which the blood of Christ serves
before God and among men. Try, if you can, to calculate the inestimable
value of the air you breathe, how every plant feeds upon it, or upon
some portion of it–how every creature, whether on the loftiest
mountains, or in the deepest mines, must have a portion of it or else
he can no longer exist. Think of the force with which it operates upon
the world in wind and tempest. Need I do more than suggest to you the
infinite number of ways in which the air becomes valuable, not merely
as an accessory to our comfort, but as a necessity of our life? Yet,
how infinitely more precious is the blood of Jesus Christ which in
every way and in every place becomes efficacious to the everlasting
salvation of all Believers! That water which sustains the life of
leviathan, and of an infinite multitude of fishes, is your drink and
mine. It makes glad the meadows, it fertilizes every field and gives to
the farmer his harvest, but while it does this, it has other uses which
we cannot stop here to discuss. See how it bears today upon its bosom
the commerce of the world and becomes the highway of nations? When you
shall have recalled all the excellencies of the water with which God
has girdled the globe, you shall then have but opened a parable
thoroughly inadequate to represent the immeasurable benefits which come
to us through Christ–and the innumerable forms which those benefits
assume! We know that it has an operation in the highest
Heaven–certainly it has saved us from the deepest Hell.

Do you see that Cross on which Jesus died? What is it more than a
simple piece of transverse wood? I see it in vision. I see it growing
till its top reaches the most excellent glory, lifting up the elect to
the very Throne of the Most High! I see its base sinking deep as our
helpless miseries could plunge us in hopeless ruin, going down till it
reaches even the depths of the vengeance of God. I see its arms spread
till all whom God has chosen are sheltered beneath them and all mankind
receive some favors which never would have come to them if it had not
been that there the Savior of sinners offered the one availing
Sacrifice for sin. As when the servant of Elijah saw a little cloud,
the size of a man's hand, and the Prophet marked in that the sign of
abundance of rain–so, when I see the Cross of Calvary, it is as a
little cloud, but faith beholds it spread all over Heaven and then drop
down in mighty showers of mercy to fructify the earth and bless the
children of men! If you would count the drops that fall from that
cloud, you must grasp "infinity" in your comprehension!

According to our text it appears that one main purpose of the Sacrifice
of Christ was the manifestation of the righteousness of God. The
Apostle twice over assures us that this was the case, "Whom God has set
forth to be a propitiation . . .to declare His righteousness." And as
if this were not enough, "to declare, I say, at this time His
righteousness." What a grand thought! The death of Jesus Christ is a
resplendent manifestation of Divine Righteousness! When we have mused
upon that, we will proceed to notice that Divine Righteousness–the
moral government of the Almighty–is, by the death of Christ, cleared
of two difficulties to which reference is made. Then we shall close by
noting the lessons which this great Doctrine teaches.

I have nothing new to say this evening–I would be ashamed of myself if
I had. This is the old Doctrine, this is the soul-saving Truth of God.
It is blessedly simple and we thank God that it is and that, therefore,
the wayfaring man, though a fool, shall not err therein. It is plain to
him that understands and if the Lord gives us understanding in this
thing, we certainly have here the beginning–and we shall soon have in
it the end of wisdom!

I. Jesus' DEATH, THEN, MANIFESTED DIVINE JUSTICE IN THE VERY HIGHEST
DEGREE.

The expulsion of our first parents from the Garden of Eden manifested
the Justice of God, but not fully. They were only expelled from
Paradise, but their lives were spared. In strict justice they would
have died. "In the day that you eat thereof you shall surely die."
Though that curse was not confined to natural death, it certainly
included it. Had Justice there been fully vindicated, the human race
would have been utterly destroyed. The expulsion of the sinner does not
so fully set forth God's Righteousness as does the Expiation of the
Savior.

The Justice of God was exhibited in dreadful forms when the deluge came
and swept the race of man from the earth. Yet why was yonder ark
freighted with the chosen eight? Were they not sinners? If Justice is
come out in its full strength, why does it permit so many as eight to
escape? The number may be few, but the principle is infringed. In
strict, severe justice, apart from the Atonement, not even Noah could
have escaped, and certainly not his unrighteous son Ham. The eight, as
they are floating yonder, indicate the exercise of some other
prerogative than that of absolute and naked justice.

Then comes the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. See them, with the
other cities of the plain, licked up by tongues of fire! Behold the
light smoke as it ascends and clouds the heavens! But here was only
Divine Justice upon one atrocious sin–a sin which will forever bear
the name of the place in which it came to its worst height. It was not
the declaration of God's Justice against sin as sin, so much as against
sin in a certain form when the virus of evil had been most banefully
developed!

Hark to the shriek that goes up from the midst of the Red Sea, when the
waters that stood upright as a heap, suddenly descend and lock in their
death-wooing arms the multitudes of Egyptian chivalry! Do you not see
here the Justice of God? You do, but you do not see it so completely,
because a multitude of sinners, in front, have escaped by this very
destruction! I grant you that, here, a most blessed type of our Lord
Jesus Christ is conspicuous, but there is not a complete declaration of
Divine Justice, for had Divine Justice slaughtered all sinners on that
occasion, Israel would have been drowned as well as Egypt! There rather
the pride of Pharaoh was subdued than the sin of Egypt. That judgment
fell only upon the chief of Egypt, the chief of all her strength was
smitten there–but judgment must come upon the little as well as upon
the great when it comes from the hand of the Most High in its absolute
force!

Of all the other judgments which we find mentioned in Holy Scripture,
it is enough to say that they were manifestations of Divine Justice,
but they were not such manifestations of it as we have in Christ. If I
might use such a metaphor, Divine Vengeance slept and all those
judgments were but its startings in its sleep. God had not yet laid
bare His terrible right arm–judgment was then His strange work. He did
not put both His hands to the tremendous work of

punishment as He did afterwards, when His only-begotten Son stood
before Him–the Just in the place of the unjust, and the Guiltless with
the guilt of man upon His shoulders!

The death of Christ did more clearly set forth the righteousness of God
than all these put together. In some respects, even Hell itself cannot
so exhaust the vindication of Infinite Justice. Do you object to this
last assertion? You may well do so till I explain my meaning. It needs
a whole eternity to set forth, in Hell, all the Justice of God in the
punishment of sin. To manifest to those who suffer, being impenitent,
all the vengeance of incensed Deity demands an ageless age of years,
countless and endless. Behold the Lamb of God! In Christ you have set
forth at once all the fullness of the vengeance of God against the sins
of men. See the cup of trembling drained to its utmost dregs. See the
baptism accomplished. He sank beneath the swelling waves of vindictive
wrath, but, lo, He rises again! He has finished the endurance and paid
the debt that none could reckon. There is more of the vindication of
Justice on the Cross than can be seen at any one time, or at any one
point, in the lowest depths of Hell!

The death of Christ gloriously set forth Divine Justice because it
taught manifestly this Truth of God, that sin can never go without
punishment I t is a law of God's moral universe that sin must be
punished. He has made that as necessary as the law of gravitation. The
law of gravitation He may suspend–the law of justice, never. He will
by no means spare the guilty. "The soul that sins, it shall die."
"Cursed is everyone that continues not in all things which are written
in the Book of the Law to do them." As the Lord had appointed the
salvation of His people, even this, the dearest desire of His soul,
does not lead Him to tamper with His inviolable Law. No, a Substitute
shall be provided, who shall to the utmost farthing pay whatever His
people owe. Upon His head the fire-cloud shall discharge itself, and
into His bosom shall be emptied out the coals of fire. No pardon
without punishment! If the question is asked, "Why not?" It is enough
to say that as long as God rules the universe, He rules it in wisdom,
and His Wisdom knows that it would be unsafe if sin were at any time
permitted to be blotted out apart from satisfaction received. Christ,
therefore, must Himself give a satisfaction for sin, that this rule may
be declared and written upon the forefront of the skies–God will not
pardon sin by overlooking it–there must be redemption before there can
be remission!

This was also shown very clearly in what the Savior had to endure. A
part of the penalty of sin is shame. The wicked will rise "to shame and
everlasting contempt." Rebellion against God is the most contemptible
thing that angels ever heard of. The devil will be recognized, at last,
as the worst of fools and become the object of intense mockery. But see
our Savior! When He takes the sinner's place, "He is despised and
rejected of men." His own disciples, as it were, hid their faces from
Him! "He was despised and we esteemed Him not." He is the song of the
drunk! Reproach has broken His heart. They that sit in the gate speak
against Him. They spit in His face! They bow the knee and hail Him with
mock homage. They put Him to the death of a slave–they give Him the
pre-eminent place of shame as center of the three crucified ones. Never
was shame more shameful than in the experience of our Lord. Here God
seemed to declare, once and for all, how shameful in His sight sin was.
When sin lay but by imputation upon His own dear Son, His Son must be
an object of scorn to the universe!

Transcendent was His sorrow as well as His shame. We cannot comprehend
His meaning when He said, "My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even unto
death." Your sympathies can never interpret those pangs of heart which
forced the blood to stream from every pore.

His physical sufferings alone are enough to make us faint if we would
but think of them aright. As for His soul's sufferings, which were the
soul of His sufferings, here is enough to melt our hearts away in grief
that we should ever have caused Him thus to die. When the Lord thus
emptied out all His quivers, and shot every arrow into the heart of His
dear Son–when all His waves and His billows went over Him–when deep
called unto deep and there was the noise of God's waterspouts, and
Christ was made to sink in deep mire where there was no standing–then
God declared most loudly what an intolerable evil sin is, how supremely
just He is and how jealous of His Justice.

In the Savior's sufferings, shame and sorrow were deepened, both of
them, by Divine desertion. ' 'My God, My God, why have You forsaken
Me?" has the grief of ages in it! Here you have tremendous pangs
distilled and given to Christ in quintessence. "Eloi, Eloi, lama
Sabachthani?" is a more desperate cry than ever came from lost souls.
Every word of it was emphatic, every syllable needs to be pronounced
with the awful force of one who is in the pangs of death and in the
pangs of Hell, for the Savior could truly say, "The sorrows of death
compassed Me, and the pains of Hell got hold upon Me. I found trouble
and sorrow. Then called I upon the name of the Lord: O Lord, I beseech
You, deliver My soul." No answer came, for God had forsaken Him! His
enemies persecuted and took Him, and there was none to deliver Him.
Herein, in the leaving of His own Son, His only-begotten Son, His
ever-obedient Son, God showed His intense Righteousness and hatred of
sin!

Nor was Christ spared the last pinch–one would have thought that He
might have been spared that–He died. Here shame, sorrow and desertion
reached the culminating point–the Savior dies. The holy soul is parted
from the pure and blessed body. He suffers the very pangs of death. He
yields up the ghost. Though Immortal, He dies! Brightness of the
Father's Glory, He slumbers in the tomb! See Him, Believer, as the
disciples take Him down, drawing out the nails, one by one, so
tenderly! See Him as they lay Him in the sheet which the holy women had
prepared, and wrap Him up in the spices which Nicodemus in his love,
and Joseph of Arimathaea in his bounty, had brought! See the Savior, as
they put Him in the tomb and go away sorrowing, for the stone is laid
and the seal is set upon Him! See Him, I say! See Him, whom angels
worship, "over all God, blessed forever," sleeping thus a captive in
the grave! Does not Jehovah here reveal how He hates sin in that He
spared not His own Son? The Christ must die when sin and expiation come
into contact, even though that contact is but by imputation!

To one more point I must call your attention. The excellency of the
Person who suffered all this is the great platform upon which God
displays His Righteousness. He who suffered this was the Just One–of
spotless nature–a King. "The King of the Jews." He was the Messiah,
the Shiloh whom God had foreordained to be the Mediator of the
Covenant. No, more than that–He was the Son of the Highest, being
begotten of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary! Mounting
higher still, He was, Himself, "very God of very God." It is a great
mystery, one which, however, we receive with reverence.

The hand that was stretched out to the nail is the very hand that
wields the scepter of universal empire! The heart that was pierced is
the very heart which will beat on throughout eternity in love to His
people! Yet more, the very Being who thus became capable of suffering,
was He who built the heavens and scattered the stars like dust along
the sky! Who bespoke the light and said, "Light be," and sent forth the
Spirit to brood over chaos, and brought order out of its confusion!
"Without Him was not anything made that was made." He is the express
image of His Father's Glory and Person–"in Him dwells all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily." I merely talk–this theme demands an angel's
tongue to sing! Sing of Him, spirits before the Throne of God, in your
rapturous song–sing of Him in wonder that He should ever leave your
happy choirs and forsake the Throne of His eternal Glory to become a
man! Sing of Him when He stripped Himself of His azure mantle and did
hang it on the sky–and took away His golden rings and hung them up
like stars–and laid aside the vestments of His glorious reign and came
to dwell in humble garments of clay! Oh, mysterious love! He came to
suffer, bleed and die! Oh, mystery of Righteousness, that such an One
as this should have to bleed, should have to smart, even to the
uttermost, and be obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross!
Never, then, did Righteousness receive such vindication as when God,
the mighty Maker, having assumed flesh, in that flesh died for man, the
creature's sin!

II. THIS GREAT MANIFESTATION OF DIVINE RIGHTEOUSNESS IN THE PERSON OF
CHRIST, as I

understand the text, INTELLIGIBLY CLEARS GOD'S MORAL GOVERNMENT OF TWO
GREAT DIFFICULTIES.

When Christ became a Propitiation, He declared God's Righteousness for
the remission of sin. We are pardoned through the forbearance of God.
For thousands of years men lived and sinned, and yet were
justified–rebelled, and yet were forgiven–wandered, yet were
restored. I say, for thousands of years poor fallible men claimed
complete righteousness and entered into the rewards which belong
exclusively to those who are justified before God. There they go,
streaming up to Heaven, a long bright line of patriarchs, Prophets,
warriors for the holy cause, kings, priests and saintly men and women
who believed in God–and this was imputed to them for righteousness.
Now here we are in a difficulty. A just God is saving all these sinners
and taking them to Heaven without any sort of vindication of His
Justice! But Christ comes in and declares the Righteousness of God,
"for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of
God," and all the difficulties of the antediluvian, Patriarchal, and
Mosaic times are cleared up at once.

Another difficulty, with which you and I are far more concerned, is how
God can be just, and yet the Justifier. The Apostle says that this was
cleared up, "To declare, I say, at this time, His righteousness; that
He might be just, and the Justifier of him which believes in Jesus."
This is the great problem which the world has been trying to solve. I
know of no religion except Unitarianism–which is not a religion, but a
philosophy–which ever pretends to do without a sacrifice.

It is remarkable that no religion can be popular except that which
deals with a sacrifice for sin. And where this is left out in any man's
ministry, you very soon find there are more spiders than hearers, and
very soon the place which might have been crowded under an Evangelical
ministry, grows empty. It is a happy circumstance that it is so, but it
is a very significant one. If a man were to open a shop for the sale of
bread and were to sell nothing but stones, it is certain that he would
have but few customers. The baker's shop is the last that is shut up in
the parish. When all other trades die out, his will live, for men must
have bread. And so if every other good thing should pass away, the
Gospel, because it meets the needs of common humanity, is quite certain
to survive them all. Dr. Patten, the other Sabbath morning, said to me
after service, "I am often asked why so many people come to the
Tabernacle and, my dear Friend," he said, "I cannot give any answer
except this one, that you try to preach that which the soul needs, the
essential and vital point of how men are saved and justified before God
through Jesus Christ. And so," he said, "if you keep to that old theme,
there is no fear but what there will be enough hungry souls to come and
feed upon that bread." And so I think it is. This I know, if a man
would have a subject that will never grow stale and never wear out, let
him preach Christ Crucified! You need not go to philosophies, nor turn
over the books in your libraries to find some novelty–the old story is
more novel than the new! There is nothing so new as Christ! We may say
of Him, "You have the dew of Your youth," for Christ Jesus and His
Sacrifice exactly meet the common needs of our humanity!

Well, there is a Sacrifice provided and that Sacrifice, dear Friends, I
say, answers the question which God has put into every man's mind–"How
can I be saved, and yet God be just?" Man has the conviction, though he
may not express it, that God is just. Every sinner knows that sin must
be punished! He may trifle with that knowledge, but he cannot destroy
it and he never can get any peace of mind, when his conscience is
really awakened, till he learns this great Truth–God punished Christ
instead of you! Christ has so honored the Law of God that, without God
being unjust, or being thought to be so, He can forgive you! There has
been such a satisfaction offered to God's violated purity that He can
be discovered to be infinitely pure–no, severely just and yet, at the
same time, infinitely gracious and merciful! O Soul, have you ever
caught a glimpse of this matter? My heart remembers when I first
understood that. Though those words, "Look unto Me, and be you saved,
all the ends of the earth," were the channel of my comfort, yet the
ground of it was this–I did see that Christ suffered for me, that
Christ stood as a Substitute for Believers and that precious Doctrine
of Substitution was the window of light to my dark soul!

Hear, you Sinners, hear this! God demands of you two things–first,
that you should keep His Law. You cannot do this, for you have already
broken it! If you never sinned again, you have put yourselves out of
court. On Sinai's mountain there is no safety for you. Even Moses said,
"I do exceedingly fear and quake," when Sinai was altogether on a
smoke. But God demands more than this. He demands punishmentfor the
sins that are past, as well as a perfect obedience for the years to
come. Can you bear this? Can you endure the flames of Hell and the
terrors of His vengeance? Your heart quails at the thought! Well, as
Christ has come into the world, He has provided for both. He knows your
need. Christ has kept the Law of God for you and Christ has suffered
the penalty of that Law, too. You have two answers to the Most High–
and when conscience says, "You must be punished, for you are guilty,"
you can say, "No, not I! Christ was punished for my sins. God will
never punish two for one offense–first the Substitute, and then the
sinner for whom He was a Substitute." And when conscience says, "Ah,
but you cannot bring in a perfect righteousness," you can answer, "Yes,
I can, for Christ has worked out and brought in a perfect
Righteousness. And He gives this to me, according to His own name and
title, 'JEHOVAH-TSIDKENU,' The Lord Our Righteousness."

Oh, that we might have Grace, dear Friends, to understand that all that
God wants of us is found in Christ! You think there is something for
you to do in order to save yourself, but Christ has saved all who will
be saved–saved them already, virtually! And you shall be saved
actually when, by humble faith, you receive the salvation which Christ
has worked out. To add to Christ anything of your own would be to tack
on your own filthy rags to His gold and silver-threaded garments! To
bring your filthy lucre to eke out the golden payment which He has laid
down at God's Throne. Do not do this, Sinner! God is content with
Christ–be you content with Him and as you see how God is just, see
also how you may be happy and at peace!

III. And now I conclude by drawing TWO PRACTICAL LESSONS.

First, let us see what an evil thing sin is and how God hates it
Christian, do you hate it too? Loathe it! Never endure it. If I had to
pass the place where some dear friend of mine was murdered, I should
dread the very spot. But if there lived

on earth the man who had stabbed my dearest friend in the heart, I
think I could never bear him affection, but I should feel moved to stir
the officers of justice to pursue him. Now, your sins have murdered
your Savior. Revenge here is holy. In other places it must be very
doubtful, but here it is sacred. Seize your sins! Where are they? Seize
yourselves and you have them. If you feel any anger against the
murderer of Christ, turn to your mirror and see his face. There stands
the man who slew his Friend. There stands he who killed his Friend who
died to save him! Yes, in the very act and suffering of murder that
Friend gave Himself up to bleed and die for the good of His murderers!
Shall I spare the sins, then, that nailed my Savior to the tree? O
Christian, how you ought to hate the very thought of sin! Sometimes we
are very severe upon the sins of others–how much more severe ought we
to be upon our own! Truly, a man's foes are they of his own household!
The very thought of sin, the word of sin, the very garments spotted
with the flesh should be hated by the Christian. The Lord give us to
feel more and more of this! We shall only get it, however, by living
more where the groans of Calvary can meet our ears and the sight of the
Savior's wounds can melt our hearts!

Then, let us see our sad condition if we are not delivered from sin. If
Christ became the Object of His Father's wrath when sin was only
imputed to Him, how angry must God be, everyday, with the wicked whose
own sins lie upon them! There can be no more dreadful thought to a
sinner than this–if we will look at it in that light–that God spared
not His own Son! Surely, if the Judge smites His own Son so severely,
He will not spare you, His enemy! Ah, you who have no Savior and who
have never looked to Christ to take away your sins, what will you do
when you have to stand before the bar of God? Christ needed to be
Omnipotent to endure the stroke of His Father's sword–what will you do
when God's dreadful voice cries, "Awake, O sword, against My foe;
against the man that despised My Son and trampled on His blood"? The
wrath of the Lamb is the worst thing a sinner can ever feel. "The wrath
of the Lamb!" Think of that! When love turns to anger, it is cruel as
the grave. To despise Incarnate Love is to entail upon yourself
infinite misery! They who perish without the knowledge of Christ,
perish happily compared with you! It shall be more tolerable for Sodom
and Gomorrah in the Day of Judgment than for you if you have despised
Christ!

My Hearers, I have tried as best I can to preach Christ to you and to
lift Him up as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. But some
of you will not look at Him. I fear you will never and that you will
die in your sins. It was but the other day that I heard of one of your
number who, after listening to this voice, suddenly went into eternity
in a moment! And the same is happening to very many. You will not be
able to say, at the last, that you never heard of Christ, or that I
covered Him up amidst a multitude of gaudy periods and high-sounding
words! I have set forth Christ Jesus in all the naked beauty of His
mysterious Sacrifice. Look to Him, Souls! If I have never been able to
move your heart before, may God move it now! Look to Jesus! Is
salvation such a thing to be trifled with, that you can live without
it? Are the joys of being reconciled to God such trifles that you will
not have them? If you had to die like dogs, it would be worthwhile to
prove the happiness of being reconciled to God in this life. But, oh,
remember the world to come! You shall soon pass through the gates of
the grave–the death-sweat will settle on your brows–the night of
death shall seal your eyes. What will you do, in those few solemn
moments when the last sands are trickling from the hourglass, without a
Savior?

Say not that these are things not to be talked of because they are too
distant! Men and women, they will come to you. Tomorrow, before next
Sabbath bells shall toll, you may be hurried to the land where the
sound of the church-going bell is never heard. May God lead you to lay
hold of Christ, now, for if not, there remains for you nothing but the
fearful looking for of judgment and of fiery indignation! The trumpet
sounds, the dead awake, Jesus sits upon the Great White Throne, the
heavens are opened, the angels come to gather God's harvest and it is
gathered into the garner. But now they come to reap the vintage–and
with their sickles they cut down cluster after cluster of the wild
vines of sin. Oh, if you are there, you must be gathered with the rest,
cast into the winepress of the wrath of God and, oh, how tremendous
will that be, when He who once tread the winepress for His people,
shall come to tread the winepress of His wrath for the last time! How
dreadful when, to use the prophetic words of the Revelation, the blood
flows forth even unto the horses' bridles! Oh, tremendous vengeance of
an incensed God, whose mercy has been despised and whose Grace has been
put away!

I am not in the habit of often using such strong words. I rather love
to plead the love of Jesus Christ to souls, but strong words must
sometimes be used, or slumbering souls will never awake. Why will you
perish? Do you choose your own destruction? Why do you choose it? Come,
let a Brother lead you back! Here, in these seats, cover your eyes, and
let the silent confession go up to Heaven. Look to Jesus Crucified! Fly
to those dear wounds of His. A Substitute for sinners! There He hangs,
and bleeds, and dies–

"There is life for a look at the Crucified One! There is life at this
moment for you"–

if you believe in Him. God give you the Grace to believe, for Jesus
Christ's sake! Amen.

EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: ROMANS 3:19-31; 4:1-21.

Romans 3:19, 20. Now we know that what things soever the Law says, it
says to them who are under the Law: that every mouth may be stopped,
and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds
of the La w there shall no flesh be justified in His sight for by the
Law is the knowledge of sin. The Law can convict and condemn, but it
can never justify the guilty. Its special work is to prove that they
are not justified in sinning and to stop their mouths from uttering any
excuse for their sin.

21-24. But now the righteousness of God without the Law is manifested,
being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets; even the righteousness of
God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that
believe: for there is no difference: for all have sinned and come short
of the glory of God; being justified freely by His Grace through the
Redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Now there comes in a new
principle–the principle of Grace which accomplishes what the Law never
could accomplish–that is, the free justification of all the guilty
ones who believe in Jesus! And this justification is a righteous one,
seeing that it is based upon "the Redemption that is in Christ Jesus."

25-27. Whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His
blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are
past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time
His righteousness: that He might be just, and the Justifier of him
which believes in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By
what law? Of works? No, but by the Law of faith. Faith's empty hand
receives the free gift of Grace–that very fact excludes all boasting!

28-31. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without
the deeds of the Law. Is He the God of the Jews only? Is He yet also of
the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also: seeing it is one God, which
shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through
faith. Do we then make void the Law through faith? God forbid: yes, we
establish the Law.

Romans 4:1-8. What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as
pertaining to the flesh, has found? For if

Abraham were justified by works, he had something to boast about, but
not before God. For what says the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and
it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that works is the
reward not reckoned of Grace, but of debt. But to him that works not,
but believes on Him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted
for righteousness. Even as David also describes the blessedness of the
man unto whom God imputes righteousness without works, saying, Blessed
are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered.
Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. There is a
special blessedness, therefore, which comes to those who, by faith, are
under the dispensation of Grace. It came to Abraham and it came to
David–yet both Abraham and David were circumcised men belonging to a
special race. So the question naturally arises.

9-12. Comes this blessedness then upon the circumcision only, or upon
the uncircumcision also?For we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham
for righteousness. How was it then reckoned? When he was in
circumcision, or in uncircumcision? Not in circumcision, but in
uncircumcision. And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the
righteousness of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised: that
he might be the father of all them that believe, though they were not
circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed unto them also: and
the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision
only, but who also walk in the steps of that faith of our father
Abraham, which he had being yet uncircumcised. The historical argument
is a very forcible one. The blessing was not given to Abraham as a
circumcised man, but as a believingman. And hence it also comes to all
of us who believe. What a mercy it is that there is, in this sense, no
distinction between Jew and Gentile! I hate that plan of reading the
Scriptures in which we are told, when we lay hold of a gracious
promise, "Oh, that is for the Jews." "Then I also am a Jew, for it is
given to me!" Every promise of God's Word belongs to all those who have
the faith to grasp it. We who have faith are all in the Covenant and

are thus the children of faithful Abraham–so be not afraid, you who
are the true seed, to take every blessing that belongs to your father
Abraham and to all the seed!

13, 14. For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was
not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the

Law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they which are of
the Law are heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of no
effect. But that would also make void circumcision and the whole of the
ancient Covenant, seeing that the blessing was given to a man whom God
had chosen before his circumcision, and before the Ceremonial Law had
even been made known.

15-17. Because the Law works wrath: for where no Law is, there is no
transgression. Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by Grace; to
the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only
which is of the Law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham;
who is the father of us all, (as it is written, I have made you a
father of many nations). Not a father of one select race of people,
only, but a father of all who, in any land, and speaking any language,
are believers in the glorious Jehovah, who is the God of Abraham, and
of Isaac, and of Jacob!

17. Before Him whom he believed, even God, who quickens the dead, and
calls those things which are not as though they were. Abraham was a
believer in the God of Resurrection, expecting to see Isaac raised up
from the dead if he did actually offer him as a sacrifice to God. He
was a believer in things that were not yet apparent to him, looking
forward to them and expecting to see them in due time–believing in
them because he believed in God, who "calls those things which are not
as though they were."

18-21. Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the
father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall
your seed be. And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own
body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the
deadness of Sarah's womb: he staggered not at the promise of God
through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; and
being fully persuaded that what He had promised, He was able also to
perform.