THE fact that people reject the mercy of the Lord is an evidence of their high calling in Christ,—that they are allied to Divinity, in that they can act for themselves. The inanimate earth acts automatically, and cannot choose but to receive and show forth the goodness of the Lord. Even the beasts, which have reason, do not know enough to resist the influence of God’s Spirit, and are all passive to his will. Now it is not the part of wisdom for man to resist God; but the fact that he can refuse to be led by him shows that God has in his great love endowed him with his own attributes; and so, when man is as passive to the will of God as the beasts and the inanimate creation are, that is counted to them for righteousness; it shows that they are worthy to rule with God on his throne. So it is because of “his great love wherewith he loved us,” because he is “rich in mercy,” that God makes us sit together with Christ (Eph. 2:4-6); and it is only this crowning mercy rejected that results in the destruction of anybody. “The earth, O Lord, is full of thy mercy: teach me thy statutes.” —Selected.