In our text, we are called upon to forgive one another, as God has forgiven us. In examining this point, we are to be guided by what he has revealed. The question here arises, how many does God command us to forgive? He commands us to forgive all, even our enemies. This then must be forgiving them as he does. He therefore forgives all. He commands us to bless them that curse us, and to pray for them that despitefully use us, and persecute us, that we may be the children of our Father in heaven. Does God command us to do more than he is willing to do himself? No, he lives up to his own command. If God requires us to forgive, even as he does, and then commands us to love and forgive all, then he loves, and forgives all, otherwise he would violate his own command; and then there would be no resemblance between his forgiveness and ours. Even as God, for Christ's sake hath forgiven you, so ought ye also to forgive one another.

Would you forgive all, and bring them home to glory? Yes. Will God? No, says the objector, he will not forgive his enemies, but his friends only. Then you must not forgive all. Do you ask why not? Because you are to forgive, even as God. He is the standard you are to imitate. If you forgive more than God, you are better than he. He cannot command you to do different from himself. If God requires you to love and forgive all, while he himself will forgive only a part, then God acts contrary to his own command. We are exhorted in the text to be kind, tender-hearted and forgiving even as he is. Do your kindness, tenderness, and forgiveness extend to all, and desire the happiness of the universe? Yes. Then also does that of God, or else you are, in every sense of the word, better than he. You differ from, instead of imitating God. If so, you are doing wrong, because you are violating the text. He commands you to be kind, tender, and forgiving only as he is;—and you contend that his kindness, tenderness and forgiveness, extend to a part only, and that all the rest he will torture world without end.

But, says the objector, God is now kind, tender, forgiving, and merciful to all; but he will not be so, when they enter eternity, for "the doors of mercy will then be shut." How do you know that—who told you so? Will God change in some future day? If he change, he will not be the same being, he is now. I thought, he was the same yesterday, today, and forever, without variableness or even the shadow of turning. I thought he was the same Jehovah in all worlds. Do you intend to make him kind, tender, and forgiving here, but unkind, unforgiving, and hard-hearted to a part of his offspring hereafter? If you intend to change both the nature and character of the Almighty in the future world, then you and myself are done arguing. That doctrine is, certainly in a pitiful condition, which drives its advocate to the necessity of changing the Almighty wholly into another being to support it. "God so loved the world, even when dead in trespasses and sins," as to deliver up his Son to "taste death for every man." And being unchangeable, he could never hate them. In our text, God commands us to forgive as he has forgiven. How many does God forgive? Ans. As many as he commands you to forgive. How many is that? All, even your enemies—to bless and curse not.

We will now introduce the question—If God has not forgiven a man today, will he ever forgive him? I answer no, for he is unchangeable. We are to apt to think that our Creator is altogether such an one as ourselves—that he loves one day, and hates the next—that he is in reality angry one hour, and pleased the next—or that he holds a grudge one moment and forgives the next, if we will only ask him to do so. But all such ideas are calculated for children—for babes in Christ. The scriptures come down to the weakest capacity; but this is no reason we should always continue children, but rise in knowledge to the strength of manhood. We ought not to be "ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." Paul said to his brethren "when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you" &c. "When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things."

The Scriptures are calculated for every capacity—for a child as well as a philosopher. We must rise from one degree of glory to another. We are not to fasten our minds down on the inventions of men, and live and die children. No—we must "forget the things that are behind, and reach forward to those that are before." As full grown men, we are not to suppose that prayer of any mortal can move the Almighty to pardon him. But says the objector, if we sincerely ask God to do thus and so, he will certainly grant our request. Very well, admit this for a moment. God, you say, will answer every sincere prayer. Now suppose two armies are to meet in battle, one from France and the other from Holland. The hour when the engagement is to commence is precisely one month from tomorrow noon. Every day, there are millions of sincere prayers offered to God to give them the day. Holland, with one voice, prays for victory and for the preservation of her subjects; and France, with united supplication, prays right the contrary. How, we ask, are all those sincere opposing petitions to be answered? Impossible. Again—one denomination prays for the prosperity of its cause, and the destruction of error. And as each believes all others to be in error, of course pray for their downfall. If the Lord answered their petitions, all denominations, of course, of course would fall! One man prays far rain, and another, that it may not rain. If God answered all these petitions, he would be as changeable, not as one man, but as the whole human family together.

As it respects God's pardoning the human race, I contend that this pardon existed from the beginning. Do not the Scriptures declare that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world? Yes, for "he calleth those things which be not as though they were." Well, could we be chosen in Christ without being pardoned? No, for the apostle says, "he that is in Christ is a new creature;" and, certainly, a man cannot be a new creature in Christ without being pardoned in the mind of Deity. If then in the omniscient mind of God, to whom there is no future, they were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, then in his mind, they must also have been pardoned before the world began. God never does a new act. By pardon we are not to understand the clearing of a guilty man from deserved punishment, but an entire deliverance from a disposition to sin. The period, when we are to be released from sin, is through death, where the earthly nature, with all its wants and temptations to sin, falls, and the heavenly nature rises in incorruption and glory through a resurrection from the dead. Is not this the day of redemption when we are set free? Yes, so saith the Scripture. Well do not redemption, remission, and forgiveness mean the same thing? They do. Then our pardon, remission or redemption will be realized through death and the resurrection. We will produce the Scriptures "in whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace." Here forgiveness and redemption are used synonymous, and are declared to be through the blood of Christ—that is, through his death, as a sacrifice for sin. Sin cannot exist beyond the sacrifice designed to take it away. He is represented as taking away the sin of the world under the figure of a Lamb. Sin will come to a finish, under the first covenant, exactly where Christ said "it is finished," at which moment the vail, concealing the "holy of holies," will be rent in twain, and the second covenant be opened. If we step beyond what Christ has said, we may as well give up the Scriptures, and trust to our own vain imaginations. There sin will end; and that is dismission, pardon or redemption from it. "O death! Where is thy sting? O grave! Where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law —but thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ."

Now, here it is represented, that our victory, over sin and death, is when we rise to immortal glory. Our victory over sin is at the same instant with our victory over death; and who will deny that our victory over death will be at the resurrection? The objector may as well deny our victory over death at the resurrection, as to deny our victory over sin at that period. The whole is said to be "through Christ." He was our "forerunner" and "first fruits" to represent our condition there. When he expired, he was free from pain, and when he arose, he was free from temptation. So when we pass the same scene, we shall be like him, who is our "resurrection and life," otherwise the harvest will not be like "the first fruits."

God, then pardoned the human race, in Christ, when he made them. How? Ans. By ordering their existence in such a manner, that they should be freed from sin through death and the resurrection. That is the day of our final discharge—the day, when the prisoner shall be set free—the day, when our redemption shall come. But asks the objector, are we not to realize our pardon in this world? Ans. Only through faith in the reality. We look forward, and anchor our hope within the veil of death, and enjoy our pardon, or redemption, only by an eye of faith. This "faith works by love and purifies the heart." It causes us, in a great measure, to break off our sins by righteousness. But this has no influence, whatever, over the sins already committed. For them, we must still continue to feel miserable. Punishment is certain. From the sins that are committed, we only enjoy our pardon or redemption from them through faith in Christ the resurrection. Paul told the believers, that if there were no resurrection, their faith was vain, they were yet in their sins. This proves that they only enjoyed the pardon of their sins through faith in the resurrection, otherwise I see no force in his language.

But inquires, the reader, why do you pray that God would pardon our sins? Ans. I do not pray to turn the Almighty from his will and purpose; but humbly trust, that I spend my days in searching out what "that perfect will of God is," and then pray in reconciliation to his revealed will. It is wicked to pray what we do not believe. "Whatsoever is not of faith is sin." I believe that God pardoned us from the beginning, and that this pardon will be realized through death and the resurrection. And when I pray that God would pardon our sins, I mean that he would grant us an evidence of that pardon, which unchangeably existed in his eternal mind, by enlightening our understanding in the Scriptures of truth, and giving us correct views of his character as a Being of tenderness and compassion to the children of men. So when we say, God has pardoned us, we do not mean that he has been moved by our petitions to do a new act; but that through the appointed means, he has so far enlightened our minds, that we have received an evidence of that pardon which existed with him from the beginning, and by faith we look forward, believing it will take place through death and the resurrection, as Christ has proved. By this faith we perceive the love of God, and break off our sins by righteousness. But while in the flesh, we feel a thorn—a hell of conscious guilt for the sins we have committed, and though the penitent may beseech God, that this messenger of satan, buffeting him, may depart from him, yet the answer will be, "my grace is sufficient for thee."

We now perceive how God pardons sin, and yet punishes us for it. The misery, sin brings upon us, is our just punishment, and to be released from it, by the free grace of God, through death and the resurrection, is our pardon and redemption—For example—we say, in a cloudy day, "the sun does not shine;" but still he does. The clouds, just above our heads, prevent his rays from shining upon us. The change is not in the sun. The clouds disperse, and we say, "the sun shines," while in fact he is ever the same. The Scriptures say, "our God is a sun." He is unchangeably the same in all his brilliant perfections. "Sin like a cloud, and transgression like a thick cloud," rise over the mind and darken the understanding. Through this dark medium we look up to God, and think he has changed—that he is angry, and thunders are rolling from his hand, while in fact the whole change is in us. The moment our minds are enlightened by the beams of truth we rejoice, and say God has forgiven us. We receive an evidence of pardon, and enjoy it through faith, while God has remained unchangeably the same.