(2.) We can see the fact throughout the history. Is there any other way of explaining either the agony in the garden, or the cry on the cross? Again and again do we see happy believers stepping down into the valley of the shadow of death in perfect peace, with a holy joy filling their hearts, and a holy calm lighting up their countenance; but the Lord Jesus, when He looked forward to it, was in agony. He sweat, as it were, great drops of blood, and He cried, ‘If it be possible, let this cup pass from me.’ I confess I know no way of explaining the difference, except by the principle of substitution, as laid down in this passage, ‘Being made a curse for us.’
So, again, I never met with any other explanation of that most marvellous cry which He uttered on the cross, when He exclaimed, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ How can that cry be explained except by the doctrine of substitution? Contrast the dying prayer of Stephen with the dying cry of the Lord Jesus Christ. Stephen said, as I trust you and I may be able to say, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit,’ and so in perfect peace he fell asleep. But the Lord Jesus was forsaken of God, and so uttered that bitter cry. How can we explain the difference? How can we understand the marvellous contrast? I never could see any explanation but one, and that is, in the doctrine of substitution. The Lord Jesus was made a curse in the place of Stephen, so Stephen was free. The sin of Stephen was imputed to the Son of God, and the righteousness of the Son of God was imputed to Stephen; so the Lord Jesus cried under the burden of the curse, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ and Stephen prayed in the peaceful enjoyment of full reconciliation, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ The burden of the curse was too awful for us to bear, and too righteous for God to set aside. So the Lord, in boundless mercy, and with His own full consent, laid it on Him. There was a transfer of the imputation of guilt, and thus by God’s marvellous grace, blessed be God, in Christ Jesus we are free.
Now all this is done, and done for ever. Nothing can add to it, and nothing can take from it. We have nothing to do with any fresh sacrifice for sin. We want no masses for either the living or the dead, and we know we cannot make up any fresh sacrifice by penance or self-denial. In all such matters the one question is, Is the one redemption by the one substitute sufficient, or is it not? If it is, we want no further sacrifice, for the work is done. If it is not, we may give up in despair, for it must be obvious to any man that if the substitution of the Son of God fall short of the requirements of the law, nothing that we can add can ever supply the deficiency. But, thanks be to God, there is no room for discussion. As we are taught in our Communion Service, ‘He made there (by His one oblation of Himself once offered) a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world.’ He was Himself the Anointed One of God, even the Son of God. In His death He fulfilled the covenant of God. In His resurrection He was accepted as having completed the work of God; in His ascension He entered into the holy place, by one offering having perfected for ever them that are sanctified.
And now what is the result? What is the consequence of this completed act of substitution? Surely nothing short of this, that every soul found in Him is legally free. Of course I am not speaking of those who reject that substitution or live without Him. They must bear their own burden; and an awful burden, I fear, they will find it. I am speaking of those who accept Him as their representative, and are one with Him as their substitute. Now to any one of them the great act of substitution has brought a full, complete, legal release. They are as free from the curse of the law as if they had never sinned. The law has no more power to condemn them than if it had never been issued, or if they had never broken it. They are washed white as snow in the blood of the Lamb, and there is no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus. So there we may rest in calm, happy, peaceful trust, for the law is satisfied, and the curse is removed. In His agony we see our peace, in His death our life, and in His bitter cry on the cross our full, perfect, and everlasting reconciliation to God.
X. ATONEMENT.
‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.’—Gal. iii. 13.
When we considered this passage in the last lecture, we did not complete the subject. We found who the Redeemer was, viz. the Christ. We found what it was that He redeemed us from, viz. the curse, or just judgment of God’s righteous law. We found also what was the redemption price, or great redeeming act, viz. the substitution of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God for the sinner. But there is a fourth point of the utmost possible importance which we had not time to investigate, viz. the question for whom, or in whose behalf, this great work was accomplished by the Saviour. But there is no part of the subject more vitally affecting our own practical life; for unless the Lord Jesus was a substitute for ourselves, we as individuals may admire His mercy, but can never have a share in the blessing of His saving work. So far as we ourselves are personally concerned, our whole hope depends on our being included in that little word ‘us,’ when it is said, ‘Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.’ If we cannot each one make use of that sentence in the singular number, and say, ‘Christ hath redeemed me, being made a curse for me,’ the passage may call forth our admiration, but to our own souls it will bring no abiding peace. It is, therefore, a matter of the deepest personal interest to us all that we should clearly understand who is included, and who is not included, in that word ‘us;’ or, in other words, who are they that the Lord Jesus Christ has redeemed by His blood.
It would have been strange indeed if a matter of such overwhelming interest had been quietly passed by without calling forth a very careful investigation, and accordingly it gave rise at one time to one of the most prominent controversies of the day. Indeed there has always been a division amongst the students of the Word of God on the subject. Some have believed in what is termed ‘particular redemption,’ a redemption limited exclusively to the elect; while others have most earnestly advocated the doctrine of a universal atonement, an atonement, i.e. made for the whole world in virtue of which a free offer of complete reconciliation is made without money and without price to every living soul.
It is my own belief that a great deal of the confusion respecting the subject arises from the indistinct use of words; and I am thoroughly persuaded that before we can ascertain whom He has redeemed, we must clearly understand what is meant by redemption. If we do not understand redemption itself, we shall never understand its limits. Now I cannot help thinking that I have proved that, throughout the word of God, redemption means deliverance; and in the case of the great salvation, deliverance through atonement. In some passages the delivering power is more prominent than in others, as, for example, in Luke, xxi. 28, and Rom. viii. 23; but in all it is there, and I do not know of a single passage in which redemption stands for atonement alone as disconnected with the consequent deliverance. Whenever it occurs it implies atonement applied, or atonement enjoyed, atonement made effectual for the actual salvation of the soul. But, though it is thus clear in the word of God, there is great confusion in many religious books. Many writers appear to speak of atonement and redemption as if they were the same, and so apply to redemption passages which speak only of atonement, and apply to atonement those texts which refer, not to atonement only, but also to the actual deliverance for which atonement has prepared the way. It is most important, therefore, that we should keep the distinction clearly in view, and never forget that the redemption of the Gospel includes two parts, deliverance and atonement. The two are bound together as intimately as it is possible. The deliverance is the consequence of atonement, and the atonement is the cause of deliverance, but both one and the other are included in the full idea of redemption, as we may see, for example, in the song sung before the throne, ‘Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation.’ Rev. v. 9. That passage clearly goes far beyond the act of substitution in redeeming mercy, for it manifestly includes an actual separation and salvation by delivering power.
Now, if we consider redemption in its full and complete sense of actual deliverance through the precious blood of the Lamb, it is perfectly clear that none but the elect of God are included in the blessing. As a matter of fact the rest are not delivered. According to St. John, the whole world lieth in wickedness, and if it is still lying in wickedness in no sense whatever can it be said to be delivered. None but the chosen people of God can ever say, ‘Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son.’ Col. i. 13. As for the rest they do not profess to be delivered. Some do not even wish for the great deliverance; some, though they may feel a certain languid wish for it, never in earnest seek for it; and others, if they do seek, seek in a wrong way, and so never find. The result is, that practically they are not delivered. Thus we all acknowledge a particular, or limited, deliverance. We none believe that all are saved; and we must believe that the Lord Jesus actually delivers those only who are His own, those whom He describes in the words, ‘The men which thou gavest me out of the world.’