Forgiveness by Spurgeon

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · May 3, 1864

Forgiveness.

By Spurgeon

OH, to be forgiven! It is enough to make a man leap—aye, to leap three times, as John Bunyan puts it, and go on his way rejoicing. Forgiven! Why, a rack becomes a bed of down, the flames become our friends, when we are forgiven. Justified! No more condemnation! Oh, the joy of that! The happiness of the slave when he lands on freedom's shore, is nothing compared with the delight of the believer when he gets out of the land of the enemy. Speak we of the joy of the poor captive who has been chained to the oar by the corsair, and who at last is delivered! The breaking of his chain is not one-half such melodious music to him as the breaking of our chains to us. "He took me out of the horrible pit, and out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and put a new song into my mouth, and established my goings." Talk not of the joys of the dance, nor of the flush of wine; speak not of the mirth of the merry, nor of the flashes of the ambitious and successful. There is a mirth more deep than these, a joy more intense, a bliss more enduring than anything the world can give. It is the bliss of being forgiven; the bliss of having God's favor and God's love in one's soul; the bliss of feeling that God is our Father, that Christ is married to our souls, and that the Holy Ghost dwelleth in us and will abide with us forever. Let the sweetness of the mercy draw thee, poor soul! Let the sweetness of the mercy, I say; entice thee.—Spurgeon.