Yes, there is mercy with God! There is forgiveness with Him! The wonder of the world still is that the God against whom we have sinned is the One who will take our sin away.
All souls that were, were forfeit once,
And He that might the vantage best have took
Found out the remedy.
That remedy was the Cross of Christ. It is He, the sinless Jesus, who has cancelled the debt. “He died for us according to the Scriptures.” It is His pierced hand that shall blot out the record of our sins. It is in His life-blood that we are to be washed free from every stain. It is at the foot of His Cross our sins are to be buried. Christ the sinless one is the Lamb of God. He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all. This is the Gospel. There is a debt against us we can never hope to pay. But God for Christ’s sake will cancel it. There are sins which crush us with their weight and burden, but God for Christ’s sake will take them all away. There are stains upon us—black and deep and foul; but the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin. Just as the snow descends from heaven and hides all the grime and filth of earth underneath its mantle until the whole surface is one pure glistening white, so God will let His mercy cover us; He will clothe us in righteousness until every stain is covered and we stand forth whiter than snow. God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not reckoning unto them their trespasses. The Cross proclaims that there is forgiveness with God. And I want to preach the free glad Gospel of the Cross to you this morning. I want to say to you sin-stricken, perishing, dying men and women, there is forgiveness with God. There is nothing which His mercy cannot do. There is no sin too great, no guilt too black for Him to pardon. A poor criminal in Scotland, as he went forth to his place of execution kept crying out, “He is a great Forgiver. He is a great Forgiver.” Yes, He is a great Forgiver! Let us men and women, ruined and undone by sin, praise God, for He is a great Forgiver. His tender mercy is ever upon us. In God’s mercy is our hope. And the Cross is the pledge of pardon which stoops to the lowest and most vile. The Cross, the Cross—the bitter, shameful Cross; the glorious, radiant Cross; our most jubilant songs arise from the Cross—
E’er since by faith I saw the stream
His flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die.
Well! and what was the price of pardon? I can tell you what it cost God. It cost God the death of His own, His only Son. The Cross was necessary to make pardon possible. “Without shedding of blood there is no remission.” That is what your forgiveness and mine cost God, it cost Him the blood of His Son. But what will it cost us? What will it cost? It will cost us nothing. As I said, when speaking of the previous petition, God does not sell, God gives. Some have tried to buy forgiveness by fasts and vigils and penances and rigid self-discipline. That is how Luther, when he was a monk at Erfurt, and Thomas Bilney, when he was a student at Cambridge, tried to obtain pardon and peace. Some have even believed that pardon was to be bought with money, so the boxes of the Indulgence sellers in Germany were filled with the coins of men and women who wanted forgiveness. But pardon is not to be bought, neither with money nor with penances nor vigils nor fasts. Forgiveness is to be had for nothing. Pardon is given without money and without price. All that is required is that you should ask for it. “Ask and ye shall receive.” Zacchæus asked, and he received it. Mary of Magdala asked, and she received it. The thief on the cross asked, and he received it. Come and ask, and you too shall receive it. Why will ye be stricken any more? Why will ye die, O house of Israel. Come and ask, and you shall hear the answer fall on your ears like sweetest music, “Son, daughter, thy sins are forgiven thee, go in peace.” That is what this petition teaches us to do. It bids us come and ask. For Jesus recognizes that we are all of us “debtors.” But the debt will be remitted for the asking. Therefore He teaches us to pray “Forgive us our trespasses.” The ground of forgiveness is not in ourselves. It is not because of our own merit that the debt is cancelled. We are saved not by works, but by grace. We are forgiven because of the boundless love that fills the heart of God, the love that found expression in the Cross of Christ. Our confidence lies in the fact that God is our Father. Let us trust the Father! Let us believe the message of the Cross! Let us not hang back through doubt or fear! Let us go with boldness to the throne of grace just as we are—guilty, sin-stained, and vile. He will cast none of us out, but He will forgive us freely; His anger will be turned away and He will comfort us, and peace like a river shall flood our troubled souls!