Sin Conquered by Love by G. W. Reaser

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jun 19, 1901

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 25.

Sin Conquered by Love

By G. W. Reaser

THE END OF SIN’S DOMINION.—NO. 5.

Sin Conquered by Love.

“Canst thou believe my song when thus I sing? When man had fallen, was ruined, hopeless, lost,— Messiah, Prince of Peace, Eternal King, Died, that the dead might live, the lost be saved! Wonder, O heavens! and be astonished, earth! Ye choral harps! ye angels that excel In strength! and loudest, ye redeemed of men! To God and to the Lamb, sing honor, sing Dominion, glory; blessing sing, and praise. O love divine! O mercy infinite! The Lord of life for guilty rebels bleeds,— Quenches eternal fire with blood divine. Saviour of men, henceforth be Thou my theme; Redeeming love my study day and night.”

“GOD is love.” His character is the very essence of love. His government is founded upon principles of unchanging love. He dwells in an atmosphere of love. His love pervades all space, and is bestowed in constant, flowing streams upon the children of men, the vast majority of whom have no appreciation of it.

Infinite love is the all-conquering force in the universe, and must finally prevail against all opposition.

When God’s love was questioned, accused, by Satan, it must of necessity be proved,—demonstrated beyond all possible question,—so that all beings surviving the ravages of the reign of sin will have hearts and minds responsive to its benign influence, and that recognize its Author as having their supreme happiness at heart in all His dealings with them. Such only can worship Him as the Supreme Ruler of the universe.

“Love can not be commanded; it can not be won by force or authority. Only by love is love awakened. To know God is to love Him. Only He who knew the height and depth of the love of God, could make it known.” The incarnation of the Son of God, the cross of Calvary, with its associations and its far-reaching results, is the greatest proof that the universe could furnish of the unfailing and self-sacrificing love of the eternal God.

The strongest evidence of love is manifested in premeditatedly laying down one’s life for another. “Before the foundations of the earth were laid, the Father and the Son had united in a covenant to redeem man, if he should be overcome by Satan. They had clasped their hands in a solemn pledge that Christ should become the surety for the human race.” “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Had it not been for infinite love, the Father would have spared His Son, and left sinners to merited destruction, to certain doom. But all the glories of heaven could not detain the Gift of God’s love, nor could the Saviour of men enjoy the bliss of heaven, while our race was imperiled. He beheld our helpless and hopeless condition; “from heaven did the Lord behold the earth; to hear the groaning of the prisoner; to loose those that are appointed to death; to declare the name of the Lord in Zion, and His praise in Jerusalem; when the people are gathered together, and the kingdoms, to serve the Lord.” And thus will redemption be the science and the song of all eternity; for the gathering of the people here mentioned is doubtless the same as that brought into the field of prophecy by Daniel, when he states that “the kingdom, and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High.”

To give full proof of unfailing love demanded one all-sufficient Example of self-sacrifice. Infinite wisdom and mercy provided it. The Gift will finally be accepted as complete, as witnessed by the prophet, when, with time-annihilating, telescopic vision he exclaimed: “I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the living creatures and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain. . . . And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever.” “And a voice came out of the throne, saying, Praise our God, all ye His servants, and ye that fear Him, both small and great;” and then, hearing the arches of heaven ring with the loud-swelling chorus of the redeemed, he adds, “I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia; for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth; let us be glad and rejoice, and give honor to Him.” The “times” when Christ will make manifest the love of God, will have fully come, and He will have shown, “who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords,” and thus “thru Christ’s redeeming work the government of God stands justified. The omnipotent One is made known as the God of love. Satan’s charges are refuted. Rebellion can never again rise. Sin can never again enter the universe. Thru eternal ages, all are secure from apostasy. By love’s self-sacrifice, the inhabitants of earth and heaven are bound to their Creator in bonds of indissoluble union.”

Thus “the great controversy is ended. Sin and sinners are no more. The entire universe is clean. One pulse of harmony and gladness beats thruout the vast creation. From Him who created all, flow life and light and gladness, thruout the illimitable realms of space. From the minutest atom to the greatest world, all things, animate and inanimate, in their unshadowed beauty and perfect joy, declare that God is love,” and all will have such a horror of sin, when its nature is so fully made apparent, that every voice and heart will accord in the acclamation,—

“O cursed, cursed sin; traitor to God, And ruiner of man; mother of woe, And death, and hell.”

G. W. REASER.