Post by Lee on Apr 2, 2014 0:40:26 GMT
GUILT AND FORGIVENESS
"The Lord is longsuffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression,
AND BY NO MEANS CLEARING THE GUILTY"-~Nm.l4:18.
THERE is apparent contradiction. If God 'by no means clears the guilty,' how can
He be said to forgive any, seeing it is only the guilty that need forgiveness? The
answer is to be found in the sense attaching to the word 'guilty' as used in this
connection. It is not in the sense of having committed an offense merely, but in
the sense of having done it with guile, and without that acceptable repentance towards
God which is the basis of forgiveness, and which secured the pardon of David
in the most heinous of offenses.
Achan may be taken as a type of the guilty that will not be cleared. He deliberately
disobeyed a Divine injunction thru avarice, and made no confession of his
sin till found out. Then he admitted the offense, that was 'known and read of all
men,' but being emphatically 4guilty,' he was not cleared.
So Korah, Da than & Abiram, and the man who blasphemed, and the one who
presumptuously broke the Sabbath law—all were specimens of the 'guilty' whom
God will by no means 'clear,' either under Moses or Christ. There is no provision
for the remission of presumptuous sin. Under the Law, no sacrifice was to be accepted
for such. -September, 1879.
"The Lord is longsuffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression,
AND BY NO MEANS CLEARING THE GUILTY"-~Nm.l4:18.
THERE is apparent contradiction. If God 'by no means clears the guilty,' how can
He be said to forgive any, seeing it is only the guilty that need forgiveness? The
answer is to be found in the sense attaching to the word 'guilty' as used in this
connection. It is not in the sense of having committed an offense merely, but in
the sense of having done it with guile, and without that acceptable repentance towards
God which is the basis of forgiveness, and which secured the pardon of David
in the most heinous of offenses.
Achan may be taken as a type of the guilty that will not be cleared. He deliberately
disobeyed a Divine injunction thru avarice, and made no confession of his
sin till found out. Then he admitted the offense, that was 'known and read of all
men,' but being emphatically 4guilty,' he was not cleared.
So Korah, Da than & Abiram, and the man who blasphemed, and the one who
presumptuously broke the Sabbath law—all were specimens of the 'guilty' whom
God will by no means 'clear,' either under Moses or Christ. There is no provision
for the remission of presumptuous sin. Under the Law, no sacrifice was to be accepted
for such. -September, 1879.