Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
7. the unrighteous man ] lit., “the man of evil” or falsehood.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Let the wicked … – In this verse we are told what is necessary in order to seek God and to return to him, and the encouragement which we have to do it. The first step is for the sinner to forsake his way. He must come to a solemn pause, and resolve to abandon all his transgressions. His evil course; his vices; his corrupt practices; and his dissipated companions, must be forsaken.
And the unrighteous man – Margin, Man of iniquity. This is a literal translation. The address is made to all people, for all are such.
His thoughts – The Hebrew word denotes all that is the object of thought; and the idea is, that the man must abandon his plans and purposes of life. The thoughts, in the sight of a holy God, are not less important than the external deportment; and no man can obtain his favor who is not ready to abandon his erroneous opinions, his pride and vanity, his plans of evil, and his purposes of life that are opposed to God.
And let him return unto the Lord – Man, in the Scriptures, is everywhere described as having wandered away from the true God. Religion consists in returning to him for pardon, for consolation, for protection, for support. The true penitent is desirous of returning to him, as the prodigal son returned to his fathers house; the man who loves sin chooses to remain at a distance from God.
And to our God – The God of his people; the God of the speaker here. It is the language of those who have found mercy. The idea is, that he who has bestowed mercy on us, will be ready to bestow it on others. We have returned to God. We have had experience of his compassion, and we have such a conviction of his overflowing mercy, that we can assure all others that if they will return to our God, he will abundantly pardon them. The doctrine is, that they who have found favor have a deep conviction of the abounding compassion of God, and such a sense of the fullness of his mercy, that they are disposed to offer the assurance to all others, that they may also obtain full forgiveness. Compare Rev 22:17 – And let him that heareth say, Come.
For he will abundantly pardon – Margin, as Hebrew, Multiply to pardon. He abounds in forgiveness. This is the conviction of those who are pardoned; this is the promise of inestimable worth which is made to all who are willing to return to God. On the ground of this promise all may come to him, and none who come shall be sent empty away.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Isa 55:7-9
Let the wicked forsake his way
The way of return to God and its encouragements
1.
Here there are apparently two things expressed–a negative and a positive, two lines of conduct expressed–a forsaking one way of living and the adoption of another, but in reality the two things are but one. They are two in thought and expression, but only one in conduct. The forsaking the wicked way and the wicked thought is no other than the returning with all our heart to God. You cannot separate them. If I were to say to a man going out to his days work. Now, do not go to the public-house this evening when you have done work, but return straight home to your wife and children, you will see that the two pieces of advice resolve themselves into one, and he would have only to go straight home from work to fulfil both duties. And so we can forsake no evil way or evil thought but by beginning to walk in the right way and cherishing the right thought.
2. There are two methods of forsaking evil ways and evil thoughts. The one by means of self-denial and self-repression when a mans conscience arrests him and sternly forbids him to continue any longer in his evil way of life, and he makes a strong resolve that he will root out the passion or the habit that has hitherto mastered him. Then a tremendous struggle begins between the spirit and the flesh, and by the force of sheer will he holds down the rebellious appetite. The sense of duty gives him strength for a time, but, alas I the tension of the will is too strained to last, and a rebound comes, and he says, I cannot maintain the strife any longer. I must yield. The other method begins at a different point. Instead of fighting the evil in pitched battles, he seeks to conquer by diverting the mind into a different channel of activity, and awakening within himself a different order of sentiments and affections.
3. You observe that the wicked is not only to forsake his way, but his thoughts also, so that the regeneration is to extend not only to the outward ways, but to the very inward thoughts of the mind, indicating how thorough and universal the change is to be. Now consider how firmly established men are in evil ways and evil thoughts, and how they delight in them, and how completely they are surrendered to their power. They do not want to change, and they do not believe they are capable of it. They say human nature is human nature, and that it is Utopian to expect men to give up ways of living common to all the world and to all the ages; and so they go on beating the everlasting round of human ways and human sin, till at length life becomes weary, and they die, and go we know not where. But there are some who are seized at intervals with better thoughts and nobler desires, who see before them a good in life after which they make Convulsive snatches.
4. I want to point out to any who are lamenting their failures, who have tried to conquer themselves, but have sunk back defeated, what is the Divine method as pointed out in the Bible–both in the Old and in the New Testament. It is what I have called the positive method–not the direct, but the indirect and successful. Here it is called, Seeking the Lord while He may be found, calling upon. Him while He is near, and a returning unto the Lord. Christ calls it a coming unto Him in our weariness, believing on Him so as to come into everlasting life. It is faith, the surrender of ourselves to Him, to His goodness, to His love, to His Spirit, and example, and will. (C. Short, M. A.)
The wicked, whose name, in the Hebrew language, is derived from a word that signifies to be unquiet. This designation will agree with the turbulent dispositions for which people of this character are often remarkable. Unquiet is their name, and unquietness is with them. They cannot cease from sin, which renders them unstable and fluctuating, and ofttimes uneasy to themselves and troublesome to society. In contempt of God and His authority, they are restless and assiduous in the practice of iniquity. (R. Macculloch.)
Conversion
I. THE CONVERSION OF A SINNER is expressed in three degrees.
1. In the forsaking of wicked ways.
2. In the forsaking of evil thoughts.
3. In returning again to the Lord.
II. THE CONDITION WHEREIN HE STANDS WHO HATH DONE ALL THIS is no state of merit, but of mercy; no, not so much as a little merit, but even abundant mercy. (J. Mode.)
An offer of mercy
I. THE COUNSEL: which is to amendment of life.
1. The act of aversion.
(1) For his,, course.. Let the wicked forsake his way.
(2) As it reaches to a mans mind. The unrighteous man his thoughts. The law of God does reach to our thoughts for ordering and regulating them. The thoughts of men are the proper issue and emanation of their souls, and so for that reason more especially to be rectified in them. The thoughts are such as whereto the Gospel and ministry of the Word does especially extend itself (Heb 4:12; 2Co 10:5). God Himself is a searcher and trier of the thoughts and inward man.
2. The act of conversion. Let him return unto the Lord. This is the nature of true repentance–it is a turning from sin to God.
II. THE PROMISE or argument to enforce this counsel and invitation. That is taken from Gods readiness to the forgiveness of sin upon that condition. (T. Horton, D. D.)
Unrighteous thoughts
These evil thoughts which are to be forsaken may be ranked into three sorts.
1. As to matter of opinion. Take a man in his natural condition, and he has many strange conceits in his head, whilst he so remains (Rom 1:21).
(1) The thoughts of sin–when a man is converted he forsakes these. In his natural condition, he many times makes nothing of sin. Fools make a mock of sin.
(2) So, also, his thoughts of grace, and godliness and godly men.
(3) So again, for his thoughts of God Himself, he must forsake these and think otherwise of Him.
2. As to matter of contemplation, he must forsake his thoughts here also. Take a carnal man, and where are all his thoughts? What is that which his mind does most run on? Why, upon the world, and the things of the world.
3. As to matter of contrivance and design. Wicked men, as they are full of vain meditations, so they are commonly full of sinful devices. And they are still laying a train for future wickedness in themselves–making provisions for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof. (T. Horton, D. D.)
Divine counsels to the wicked
I. THE COUNSELLOR. The Father of the wicked is here speaking to the wicked. He who speaks knows every wicked man. He who speaks hates evil. He who speaks hath power to destroy the wicked in hell. He desireth not the death of one transgressor, but rather that he should turn unto Him and live. It is the redeeming God who is here addressing the wicked man.
II. HIS COUNSEL. Let the wicked forsake, etc. We have ways in common; but we have ways that are individual and peculiar to ourselves. Every man has his way of thinking, and reasoning, and imagining, and feeling, and willing, and acting. Now, the wicked setteth himself in a way that is not good, and God says, Get out of it, forsake it. This advice is based upon the following facts. The way of the wicked and the thoughts of the unrighteous are absolutely wrong. They are injurious–injurious to the wicked man himself, Further, repentance now is possible; for the Son of the Father now speaking to the wicked man, is exalted to give repentance and remission of sins. Further, God Himself seeks it. This advice requires–
1. Self-inspection. It asks the wicked man to look at his way. It says to him, Look back–it has been a rough way, sometimes covered, it is true, with bright green grass, and with soft enticing moss; but the flints have come through it all, and have made the feet often bleed: so that if the wicked man will look back, he will find blood-marks on his way, an evidence that the way of transgressors is hard. The wicked man is not only to look at his way, but the unrighteous man at his thoughts. He is to consider his purposes.
2. The admission of truth as to the character of the way, and as to the nature of the thoughts. It is quite possible that a wicked man looking back, and seeing his path to be hard, will try to forget it. God says, admit the truth.
3. The resistance of an inclination to go on.
4. Submission to the conviction that the way is evil, and the abandonment of every unrighteous purpose, with actual departure from the path of open and actual transgression. It is just possible that in the midst of a multitude of transgressions, there is one master sin; and that master sin, it may be, the key-stone of all your transgressions. Take that away, and your habits of sinning are broken up. This advice requires appeal to God for mercy, and for help and reconciliation.
III. THE COUNSELLED. If you take a Concordance and look through it at the word wicked, I think you will be astonished to find how often the winked are recognized in Holy Scripture, and men often talk about the wicked. But God and men do not always mean the same thing. Men unduly limit the application of this word. They call the immoral wicked, and only the immoral. Now hear what the Lord says in describing a wicked man. God is not in all his thoughts; so that he is a wicked man who does not recognize God in Gods own world.
IV. THE PROMISE OR ASSURANCE BY WHICH THIS ADVICE IS SANCTIONED AND SUSTAINED. It is like the promise made to faith; you must believe in order to realize the promise. It is like the promise made to repentance: you must repent in order to realize the promise. The promise is conditional; and yet, mark, it is sure. The promise is made, further, to characters. There is, therefore, an indefiniteness about it which may well encourage you. It is not necessary I should go into your wickedness, or that I should at all define or describe your thoughts. (S. Martin.)
The need and nature of conversion
This is not a merely legal demand; it is a Gospel demand, found in the centre of a Gospel chapter in the writings of the most evangelical of all the prophets.
I. THE NECESSITY OF CONVERSION. Right about face! is the marching order for every sinner.
1. This will be at once evident when I ask, How would it be consistent with the holiness of God for Him to put aside our past sin, and then to allow us to go on sinning as we did before?
2. Neither is there a single case in fact, nor one emblem in parable, that would lead any man to hope that he could keep his sins, and yet be saved.
3. Besides, our common-sense tells us that it would be highly dangerous to society if men were to be pardoned, and yet were not to be renewed in character and lira.
4. Moreover, it would be a serious injury to the man himself, I have come to the conclusion that the very worst form of character is produced in the man who, for some reason or other, thinks himself to be a favourite of Heaven, and yet continues to indulge in sin.
II. THE NATURE OF THIS CONVERSION. How is it described here?
1. It deals with the life. Let the wicked forsake his way. It is his way that he is to forsake; that is his natural way, the way in which he says he was brought up, the way that his natural affections, and propensities, and passions lead him. He must forsake this way, even though it is the way in which he has walked these thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy, or even eighty years; he will have to get out of this way, however much he may delight in it. I will tell you what I will do, says one; I will still keep to my old way, but I will not travel quite so rapidly in it. I will not live such a fast life as I have done. I tell thee that thou must forsake that old way, of thine altogether if thou wouldst be saved. That is pretty strong language, says some one. Do you think so? I shall have to use still stronger expressions presently, for the next point concerning the nature of this repentance is that–
2. It deals with the mans thoughts. In thought, is often the very essence of sin. A deed might in itself be colourless; but the motive for doing it–the thought at the back of it–puts the venom, and virus, and guilt into the deed. As that is the case, what sort of thoughts must the unrighteous man give up? He must give up a great many fine opinions of which he is very proud; his opinion about God, for instance. To the ungodly man it is often quite a treat to sit down, and think of what he calls the jolly days of his youth, when he sowed his wild oats. We must also forsake our thoughts in the sense of turning from all purposes of evil. That, indeed, is the main meaning of the Hebrew word used here: Let the unrighteous man forsake his purposes. You say that you will do this or that, without any thought of whether God would have it so or not. Possibly it is your purpose, as you express it, to have your fling. You have come up from the country, young man, you are pleased that you have got away from your mothers apron strings, and now you are going to have your own way. Forsake all such thoughts, I implore you.
3. The text further says, and let him return unto the Lord,- so that this conversion deals with the sinner in his relation to God. He who would find mercy must return to God to obtain it.
(1) You must begin to think about God.
(2) Then you must yield to Him, give up your will to His will; and, doing that, you must pray to Him, cry to Him for mercy; and then you must trust Him. Especially, you must accept His way of salvation by faith in Jesus Christ.
III. THE GOSPEL OF THIS CONVERSION. Possibly somebody says, You have been preaching to us the law, sir. No, I have not. The law says nothing about repentance. The law curses you from the very first moment when you have broken it. That gracious message, Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, is not the utterance of law, but of the Gospel.
1. The Gospel of it lies in the fact that God has promised that He will abundantly pardon those who turn from their evil ways.
2. Not only does God bid men turn to Him, but He enables them to turn to Him; so the Gospel of this passage is, that God the Holy Ghost is freely given to sinners to turn them, first in their hearts, and then in their lives.
3. Jesus Christ Himself came into the world on purpose that this Divine Spirit might be given in connection with the exercise, by men, of faith in Him.
4. God gave His Son, Jesus Christ, to offer a full and complete atonement for sin. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
From desert to garden
This verse leaves nothing unsaid that needs to be said to the inquiring soul. In simple and orderly declaration, it lays before us the whole fact of human responsibility and Divine promise concerning mans salvation. We shall best understand our text by seeing its relation to the context. This chapter is a perfect prophetic message in itself. Intimately related to that which has preceded it, vitally connected with that which is to follow, it may yet be taken as one direct utterance of the prophet of God to people living under certain conditions of life. The chapter presents a remarkable and-striking contrast. The conditions described in the first part are utterly different from those described in the last. The figures made use of are different. Mark the condition of life to which the prophet was addressing himself. Every one that thirsteth, he that hath no money, ye spend money for that which is not bread, your labour for that which satisfieth not, a people who are thirsty, and hungry, and hard-working, and never satisfied. Towards the close of the chapter, different conditions are described:–Ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace (verses 12, 13). You see the contrast. In the one case you have the desert, in the other the garden; in the one, hot, restless, dissatisfied life; in the other, joy, peace, singing. In each the language is figurative, but figurative of a very positive condition of life. But how can I get from the desert into the garden? Half-way through this chapter, by a coincidence of arrangement, in the central verse, is the gateway through which a man may leave the desert and get into the garden. Let the wicked forsake his way, etc. In this verse I have the perfect laying out of the plan of salvation. In an analysis of the verse I discover the philosophy of salvation, and in the structure of the verse I find the simple programme of salvation. There are two parts to this verse.
I. SOMETHING FOR MAN TO DO. Here are three things the prophet declares to be necessary. They are not three, but one; each merges into the other, and it is only as the final one is obeyed that the former ones are obeyed; and yet let us take them in their sequence.
1. Let the wicked forsake his way.
2. The unrighteous man his thoughts.
3. Let him return unto the Lord. As a matter of fact, the prophet here is beginning in the outer reaches of life, passing to the inner circle, until he comes to the central fact of mans nature. We will begin in this outer court.
The Hebrew word translated way at this point means a beaten track, the way along which a man habitually walks; and it is used figuratively in Hebrew writings of the general set and direction of a mans life, and the prophet says that the first thing a man has to do if he is to come back into the garden is to leave his way, the outward set, and direction of his life. Then he comes to another word, Let the unrighteous man forsake his thoughts, and the Hebrew word here means literally a web, figuratively a plan, a conception, an ideal. So that the prophet now has come to something deeper than the outward set of a mans life. He is to give that up by giving up his inward conception of life. And how is a man to give up his outward way and the inward conception, and why is a man to give up his outward way, and his inward conception? He is to give it up by returning, to the Lord, and he is to give it up because it is not the Lords way and the Lords thought. Notice what immediately follows this seventh verse. In the Authorized Version, at verse 8, there is a paragraph mark that we need to dispense with. The paragraph mark is put in to indicate the fact that the prophet there begins a new subject. As a matter of fact, he does nothing of the sort; he goes right on with the same subject. Here we are touching the fundamental question of sin. When the prophet calls a man to forsake his way, it is not that he asks him to give up drinking, or thieving, or lying, or impurity. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one to his own way. That is the essence of sin. The essential trouble is not that a man drinks, or swears; it is that he has elected to go his own way, instead of Gods way. The underlying root sin of humanity is rebellion against the government of God. That sin may manifest itself in vulgar forms, against which we sign pledges; or it may manifest itself in the cultured and refined paganism that attempts to live without prayer and without worship. I will tell you, in the name of God, what is the trouble in your life! It is godless, that is the trouble. I will tell you why you are in the desert. You have turned your back upon God. I will tell you why you are never satisfied with water or bread. It is because you have left the place of intimate and first-hand relationship to God. Do you want to get from the desert, back to God? Forsake your way; take His. Give up your thought; take His. But, says some man in his pride, why should I give up my way, and take Gods way? And why should I give up my thought, and take Gods thought? Go right on, and see what the prophet says (verse 8). Gods thought for you is the thought of Heaven. Yours is the thought of earth. God thinks infinitely more of you than you think of yourself. Yours is a degraded estimate of your own life. Will you say, Yes, that true, I will return to the Lord.
Then I know immediately your face is set toward Gods high conception, toward Gods great highway, the next consciousness will be that of your sin, the wasted years will come sweeping back upon you like an avalanche. If, indeed, thou art at this wicket gate, and thy face is set back toward, God then hear the evangel, He will have mercy. He will abundantly pardon.
II. SOMETHING THAT GOD WILL DO. You are to do what He tells you, and He will do what He promises. You arc to obey; that is repentance. You are to trust Him; that is faith. That is the whole programme of salvation. (G. C. Morgan, D. D.)
The way to pardon
I. A VIVID PORTRAIT.
1. It introduces the man of evil deeds.
2. We have likewise the portrait of the man of unholy purposes. What a mirror the text holds up to society!
II. AN EARLIEST EXHORTATION.
1. Let the wicked forsake, etc. The sinner is required to forsake, to abandon his sin.
2. Let him return unto the Lord. The sinner lives abnormally, unnaturally. He is a prodigal away from home, a wandering sheep beyond the protection of the fold, a lost piece of silver. Hence religion is a return to God, to first relations, to natural courses of behaviour. Sinners are like wandering stars escaped from their orbit. Conversion restores them to their proper place in the onward sweep of the Divine purpose. The text is a disclosure of the nature of true repentance and of saving faith.
III. AN EXCEEDING GREAT AND PRECIOUS PROMISE.
1. And He will have mercy upon him. Mercy is Gods wealth. Rich in mercy.
2. Abundantly pardon. What music is in these words! (Homiletic Review.)
Repentance
In the exhortation to repentance in Isa 55:7, both sides of the find expression–the forsaking of sinful selfishness, and return to the God of salvation. (F. Delitzsch, D. D.)
Repentance
I. THE OBLIGATIONS TO AN EARLY REPENTANCE.
II. THE TRUE NATURE OF REPENTANCE. (J. Taylor, LL. D.)
The surrender of the thoughts
Another thing we have to give up, and which is harder, I think, than giving up the will and the way, is our thoughts. Most men have their thoughts about the way in which they are to be saved. Because God does not con vert them in the way they have planned, or think He should, they think they cannot be saved. Man thinks he can repent when he is sick and about to die. He thinks that is better than repenting in early life; and some go further and say, I think a man can repeat after death; I think there will be another chance if he misses his chance in this life. And another class says, I think we are all going to be saved; the pure with the impure are all going to be swept into the Kingdom of God. That is mans thought; but that is not Gods thought. Man thinks he can be saved by works. Gods thoughts are altogether different. It is to him that worketh not, but believeth. After a man is born into the Kingdom of God, he ought to show his faith by works; but we do not work for salvation. Others think that you must be saved by ordinances. Ordinances are all right in their place; but when you come to put ordinances in the place of salvation, that is a great mistake. Some people say, I should like very much to get rid of my sins, and if I could get rid of them I would come to Christ. Here a great many fall into a pit. If we could get rid of our sins, we should not want a Saviour. It is because we cannot get rid of our sins that we need to come to Christ. (D. L. Moody.)
The moral disparity between mans thoughts and ways, and Gods thoughts and ways, an argument for a moral change on mans part
I. GOD HAS ENDOWED MAN WITH CAPACITIES TO ACT IN SOME MEASURE LIKE HIMSELF, INASMUCH AS BOTH HAVE THEIR THOUGHTS AND WAYS.
1. God has His thoughts–thoughts about Himself–the universe; about all actualities and possibilities. Some of His thoughts have been embodied and their forms destroyed, centuries ago Some are now embodied in creation, In historical events, in redemption, etc. Some are yet to be embodied in new universes, etc. And some will never take form. There is an infinite ocean of thought in the Divine mind that has never yet taken form, and never will.
2. God has His ways. He has settled methods of action. He has a method of creating, governing, destroying, and saving. Hence science and art, which imply settled methods.
3. Man has his thoughts. He is full of thought, of some sort or other; he thinks by a necessity of his nature; his power to think is the glory of his nature.
4. Man too has his ways. He has his methods of doing things.
II. BETWEEN THE THOUGHTS AND WAYS OF WICKED AND UNRIGHTEOUS MEN AND THOSE OF GOD THERE IS AN IMMENSE MORAL DISPARITY. My thoughts are not your thoughts, etc. We say moral disparity, for natural disparity must exist by an eternal necessity. We may mention two points of moral difference. One in relation to being in general, and the other in relation to enemies.
1. As to the former, Gods thoughts and ways are concerned for the general happiness, those of wicked men for personal ends.
2. As to the latter, Gods thoughts are concerned for the pardon of the offender, those of the wicked for punishment.
(1) God graciously offers pardon to the offender. Do the wicked do so?
(2) God graciously offers pardon to offenders much beneath Him. Do the wicked do so?
(3) God graciously offers pardon to offenders who have repeatedly rejected His overtures. Do the wicked do so?
(4) God graciously offers pardon through a wonderful sacrifice–His Son. Would the wicked do so?
III. THE MORAL DISPARITY BETWEEN THE THOUGHTS AND WAYS OF WICKED MEN AND THOSE OF GOD RENDERS A CHANGE ON THE PART OF THE FORMER URGENTLY NECESSARY. Let the wicked, etc. Why? Because
My thoughts, etc. Two thoughts are implied here, and will show the strength of this reason.
1. A moral disparity of thought and way between the creature and the Creator is eternally incompatible with the creatures well-being. Gods thoughts and ways are the resistless forces of the universe. He who thinks and acts contrary battles against every wind and wave of being and the mighty Spirit in all. He must be crushed.
2. The removal of this disparity will never take place by any change on Gods part. The words imply this, and it is a great truth. God cannot change, and there is no need for Him to change. Here, then, is the argument; if a moral disparity exists, and if the removal is essential to our well-being, and if God cannot change, let the wicked, etc.
IV. THIS GREAT CHANGE ON THE PART OF THE WICKED IS ENCOURAGED BY THE ASSURANCE THAT GOD WILL MERCIFULLY DEAL WITH HIM ON HIS RETURN. He will have mercy on him; He will abundantly pardon. (Homilist.)
Gods ways and mans ways
I. WHY, IN SO FAR AS GODS NATURE DIFFERS FROM MANS, HE MAY BE SUPPOSED LESS LIKELY TO FORGIVE.
1. God knows us more thoroughly than any human being; He knows the worst of us, and He knows the great hidden element of character which is only occasionally betrayed.
2. Ha knows the motives, and knows that there are bad motives even for good actions.
3. He judges our sins by an infinitely higher standard than mans.
II. WHY GOD IS, JUST BECAUSE OF THAT DIFFERENCE, INFINITELY MORE LIKELY TO FORGIVE.
1. Among men the best and purest are not the severest censors and judges, for human goodness is the more merciful in proportion as it approaches nearer to perfection.
2. In God there is no fictional irascibility or resentment. Christs life on earth was the story of a long, silent, immovable patience, of absolute lifelong superiority to personal feeling.
3. Although to justice or righteousness it is some satisfaction that a bad man should be miserable, yet it is another nobler and sweeter satisfaction that he should become a good man. (J. Caird, D. D.)
Pardon for the penitent
We find in the text,–
I. AN EXHORTATION TO REPENTANCE. Here, in few words, we are given plainly to understand in what genuine repentance consists.
II. THE PROMISE OF PARDON ANNEXED TO THE EXHORTATION. If the wicked will forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and return unto the Lord, He will have mercy upon him, and will abundantly pardon him. Repentance is here enjoined as a prerequisite to pardon. And do not other passages of Scripture speak the same language? We must not, however suppose that there, is anything meritorious, in our repentance. It possesses no virtue or efficacy to expiate our guilt. It Is our bounden duty, but it makes no compensation for past failures; no atonement for past transgressions. It is itself the gift of God, who has exalted His beloved Son to be a Prince and a Saviour, in order to bestow it on the rebellious. It can therefore deserve nothing. Nevertheless, it is to the penitent alone that God extends His pardoning mercy. Why? It would be enough to answer, that such is the good pleasure of His will; but we can also add, that the penitent alone is qualified to receive and appreciate the blessing. But it may be asked, How can God be favour-able to the sinner? For an answer we must turn to the Gospel of His grace, which alone informs us how He can be a just God and yet a Saviour.
III. AN ENCOURAGEMENT TO LAY HOLD OF THE PROMISE. What answer do you make?
1. Some one, perhaps, in the brokenness of his heart may reply, Yes, I must believe that God is indeed merciful and gracious. I perceive also that He can, in the Son of His love, be a just God and a Saviour. But, alas! my sins have been so numerous that, though He may forgive others, I cannot persuade myself He will extend pardon to me. But what saith God? My thoughts are not your thoughts. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My thoughts higher than your thoughts.
2. But, says another, my sins have been not only numerous, but highly aggravated. If you had sinned so often and so heinously against your fellow-creatures, you might well despair of forgiveness. It is too much, alas I our way to retaliate evil for evil. But your ways are not My ways, etc.
3. I seem to hear a third in anguish of spirit exclaiming, I am one of those awful characters known in Scripture by the name of backsliders. The words here translated abundantly pardon, are rendered on the margin multiply to pardon. The Lord will pardon, not once only, but again, and again, and again. Conclusion: It is painful to think that any one should be so wicked, and so lost to every grateful feeling, as to pervert such a subject. Yet it is a fact that many are guilty of so doing. There are two characters especially who come under this charge. One of them is the hardened and impenitent transgressor, who takes encouragement to proceed in his sinful career from the consideration that God is merciful, and will not fail to pardon him at the last.
2. The other is the antinomian professor of religion, who professes to know God, but in works denies Him, and endeavours to lull conscience to rest by extolling His sovereign and superabounding grace. The grace of God was never meant to embolden us in a course of transgression; nor does it ever produce this effect on those who know it in truth. (D. Rees.)
Refuge in Gods mercy
There is a story of a man who dreams he is out in an open field in a fierce, driving storm. He is wildly seeking a refuge. He sees one gate over which Holiness is written. There seems to be shelter inside, and he knocks. The door in opened by one in white garments, but none, save the holy, can be admitted; and he is not holy. So he hurries on to seek shelter elsewhere. He sees another and tries that, but Truth is inscribed above it, and he is not fit to enter, He hastens on to a third, which is the palace of Justice; but armed sentinels keep the door, and only the righteous can be received. At last, when he is almost in despair, he sees a light shining some distance away and hastens toward it. The door stands wide open, and beautiful angels meet him with welcomes of joy. It is the house of Mercy, and he is taken in and finds refuge from the storm and is hospitably entertained. None of us can ever find a refuge at any door, save at the door of Mercy. But here the vilest sinner can find eternal shelter; and not mere cold shelter only, for Gods mercy is tender. (J. R. Miller, D. D.)
He will abundantly pardon
Pardoning mercy abundant
I. THE ABUNDANCE OF GODS PARDONING MERCY IS EVINCED BY THE REMOVAL OF THE OBSTACLES TO ITS EXERCISE. It was not by annihilating–by scattering our iniquities in the regions of oblivion with no evidenceof the Divine abhorrence–that the way is open for their remission But God laid upon His Son the iniquities of us all.
II. THE ABUNDANCE OF GODS PARDONING MERCY MAY BE ARGUED FROM HIS BENEVOLENCE. The goodness of God–i.e. His whole character–is intent on the promotion of the greatest good. When this end demands the punishment of sin, this goodness dictates it, and in this consists what we call justice. When this end is the pardon of the sinner, the same goodness dictates it, and in this consists mercy.
III. THE ABUNDANCE OF GODS PARDONING MERCY MAY BE EVINCED FROM THE RICHES OF HIS FORBEARANCE AND LONGSUFFERING. Consider–
1. The objects of the Divine forbearance; a world, our whole species in rebellion.
2. Its design; their repentance and salvation with eternal glory.
3. Its circumstances; how easy for Omnipotence to break the thread that holds us over the pit, and yet He spares us–He spares sinners, while He regards them with all the abhorrence that is due to sin–He spares them, while He can glorify Himself in their instant and eternal destruction–He spares them, when in the midst of great and repeated provocations, when, from the very patience of God, they derive only hardihood in rebellion–He spares them that He may use every possible means for their conversion and salvation. He comes to them in His Word and in His providence; by the chastisements and the bounties of His hand; by every moments preservation; in the counsels and prayers and example of the pious; in visible displays of His eternal power and Godhead; by the heralds of the Cross, who warn them night and day with tears; in the opened gates of heaven, and the uncovered mouth of the pit; in full displays of the beauty and glory and sufficiency of an incarnate Saviour. Why these efforts to bring to repentance, if He has no mercy for the penitent? (N. W. Taylor, D. D.)
Abundant pardon
The certainty of their finding pardon was the tempting bait with which this ancient fisher of souls endeavoured to catch men.
I. GOD DOES ABUNDANTLY PARDON. We will turn that truth over and over, and see it in many lights.
1. The pardon of God may well be abundant, for it wells up from an infinite fountain; mercy, which endureth for ever.
2. The objects to which this pardon has been extended are abundant too. Well is it said, He will abundantly pardon, for God has already pardoned sinners more numerous than can be estimated by human arithmetic.
3. His pardon is abundant when we consider the abundance of the sins which the love of God blots out.
(1) Sins of thought–rebellious thoughts, proud thoughts, blasphemous thoughts, atheistical thoughts, covetous thoughts, lustful thoughts, impatient thoughts, cruel thoughts, false thoughts, thoughts of ill memory, and dreams of an unholy future; what swarms are there l Moreover, the omission of thoughts which should have been, such as thoughts of repentance, gratitude, reverence, faith, and the like, these are equally numerous: with the double list my roll is written within and without with a hideous catalogue. As the gnats which swarm the air at eventide, so numerous are the transgressions of the mind.
(2) Sins of word. What words have vexed the pure and holy ear of God! Words against Himself, against His Son, against His law and Gospel, against our neighbour, against everything that is good and true! Words proud and hectoring, words defiant and obstinate, words untruthful, words lascivious, words of vanity, and words of wilful unbelief.
(3) Sins of deed, which in very truth are but the fruits which grow out of sins of thought.
(4) Perhaps the sins we do not know are more numerous than the sins we are conscious of. Conscience may not be properly enlightened, and hence many a thing may not seem to be sinful which really is so; but Gods clear eye perceiveth everything that is obnoxious to His holy law. Innumerable sins are forgiven by one word from the lips of Divine love.
4. We can see the truth of this in the abundant sin of those sins which are pardoned. Did you ever find a spiders nest just when the young spiders have all come to life, it is a city of spiders; now, such is any one sin, it is a colony of iniquities, a living mass of offence. In addition to there being many sins in one sin, I want you to remember how much virus of sin we sometimes manage to stow await in a sin. A man has done wrong and smarted for it, yet he does the very same thing again wilfully, against his own conscience and against the warning he has received. A man will sometimes acknowledge what a fool he has been, and yet play the fool again. Some men sin for no motive whatever–for mere wantonness of sin.
5. The Lord abundantly pardons, when we consider the abundant means of pardon which he has been ever pleased to provide for sinners.
6. The abundant ease of the terms of pardon. Let the wicked forsake, etc., that is all! No man can expect to be forgiven if he goes on with his sin.
7. The abundance of this pardon may be seen in the fulness of it.
8. He doth abundantly pardon, because of the abundant blessings which attend that pardon.
II. THE INFERENCES WHICH FLOW OUT OF ABUNDANT PARDON.
1. There is no room for anybody to despair.
2. There is a loud call to every one who has not repented to do so; for who would be so base as to offend so good, so kind a Lord?
3. If there is anybody in this house the text especially calls, it is the biggest sinner here; because there cannot be abundant pardon where there is not abundant sin.
4. For such a forgiving God we ought in return to have great love. (C. H.Spurgeon.)
Mohammedism or Christi-unity
I have heard men say, often, Why is it Jesus Christ has so few disciples? The Gospel has been preached for 1,800 years, and yet Mohammed has more disciples than Jesus Christ. The question is very easily answered. A man can be a follower of Mohammed, and not give up his sin. He may be a follower of Confucius without giving up his sin; and the reason Jesus Christ has so few disciples is that men are not willing to part with their sin. If men could only get into the Kingdom of God without giving up anything, they would push into it by the thousand. (D. L. Moody.)
Free pardon
When I was preaching in Yorkshire at some mission services, a collier came to me at the close of one of the services, and said to me, I would like to be a Christian, but I cannot receive what you have said to-night. I said, My brother, why not? He said, I would give anything to believe that God would forgive my sin; but I cannot believe He will just forgive it if I turn to Him. It is too cheap. I looked at him, and I said, My dear friend, have you been to work to-day? Yes. Where have you been working? He looked at me slightly astonished, and said, I was down in the pit, as usual. How did you get home? Oh, I walked home along the road. But how did you get out of the pit? The way I always do. I got into the cage, and I was pulled up to the top. How much did you pay to come out of the pit? He looked at me astonished, and said, Pay? Of course, I dont pay anything. I said to him, Were you not afraid to trust yourself in that cage? Was it not too cheap? Oh, no, he said. It was cheap for me, but it cost the company a lot of money to sink that shaft. And without another word the truth of that admission broke upon him, the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and he saw if he could have salvation without money and without price, it had cost the Infinite God a great price to sink that shaft and rescue lost men. (G. Campbell Morgan, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Let the wicked man, any wicked man, either Jew or Gentile, forsake his way; his evil or wicked way, as is evident from the foregoing word, and as it is more fully expressed, Jer 18:11; 25:5; which is called his way, because it is natural, and customary, and dear to him, and in opposition to Gods good way; his sinful course or manner of life. Let him cease to do evil, as it is Isa 1:16. This he adds, to intimate that mens seeking and calling upon God will do them no good without reformation of their lives.
His thoughts; the sinful devices and purposes of his mind. Thus he strikes at the root of sinful actions, and showeth that the heart must be purged and changed as well as the outward actions.
Let him return unto the lord; as he hath departed from God by sin, let him turn to him by sincere repentance, and the practice of all Gods precepts; whereby he intimates that a mere abstinence from wicked courses is not sufficient, without the exercise of the contrary graces; that we must not only cease to do evil, but also learn to do well, as it is prescribed, Isa 1:16,17.
To our God; to the God of Israel, who is and hath showed himself to be a most merciful and gracious God.
For he will abundantly pardon: he useth so many words and arguments to encourage them to repentance, because the persons here invited were guilty of idolatry, apostacy, and many other gross wickednesses; which he knew, when they came to themselves, and to a serious sense of their sins, and of the just and holy nature and law of God, would be an insupportable burden to their awakened consciences, and make them very prone to conclude that God either could not or would not pardon such horrid delinquencies, and therefore would rather drive them from God, than draw them to him.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
7. unrighteousHebrew,“man of iniquity”; true of all men. The “wicked”sins more openly in “his way”; the “unrighteous”refers to the more subtle workings of sin in the “thoughts.”All are guilty in the latter respect, thought many fancy themselvessafe, because not openly “wicked in ways” (Ps94:11). The parallelism is that of gradation. The progress of thepenitent is to be from negative reformation, “forsaking hisway,” and a farther step, “his thoughts,” to positiverepentance, “returning to the Lord” (the only truerepentance, Zec 12:10), andmaking God his God, along with the other children of God (thecrowning point; appropriation of God to ourselves: “toour God”). “Return” implies that man originallywalked with God, but has apostatized. Isaiah saith, “ourGod,” the God of the believing Israelites; those themselvesredeemed desire others to come to their God (Psa 34:8;Rev 22:17).
abundantly pardonLiterally,”multiply to pardon,” still more than “have mercy”;God’s graciousness is felt more and more the longer one knows Him (Ps130:7).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Let the wicked forsake his way,…. His evil way, as the Targum paraphrases it, his wicked course of life; and which is his own way, of his own choosing, and in which he delights, and a very dangerous one it is; and yet he is bent upon it, and nothing can turn him from it but efficacious grace; nor will he ever forsake it till he sees the evil, danger, and loathsomeness of it; and when he does forsake it, it is so as not to make sin the course of his life, though he does not and cannot live without sin. The word for “wicked” signifies restless, troublesome, and ungodly, and is expressive of the pollution and guilt of sin all are under. Some are notoriously wicked, and all men are wicked in the account of God, though they may think otherwise themselves; and they become so their own apprehensions, when they are thoroughly awakened and convinced of sin, and of the evil of their ways, and are enabled to forsake them: though this may also be understood of “his own way” of saving himself, which is by works of righteousness he has done, in opposition to God’s way of saving men by Jesus Christ; which way of his own must be relinquished, and Christ alone must be applied unto, and laid hold on, for salvation:
and the unrighteous man his thoughts: not his natural thoughts, but his sinful ones, his wrong thoughts of religion, righteousness, and salvation; particularly his thoughts of being justified by his own righteousness; which thoughts are to be forsaken, as being contrary to God’s way of justifying sinners; and as all men are unrighteous, are destitute of righteousness, and full of unrighteousness, so is the self-righteous person; and he must be divested of all thoughts of his own righteousness, and acknowledge himself an unrighteous man, ere he receives mercy, forgiveness, righteousness and salvation, at the hands of the Lord:
and let him return unto the Lord; from whom he has departed, against whom he has sinned, and who only can save him; and this he does when he comes and acknowledges his sin before the Lord, implores his grace and mercy, and attends his word and worship; all which is the fruit and effect of powerful and efficacious grace, in turning and drawing. The Targum is,
“and let him turn to the worship of the Lord:”
and he will have mercy upon him; which shows that the returning of the sinner to God is not meritorious, it is mercy still to receive him; and which is here mentioned as the motive to return; there is an abundance of it with the Lord, and he has resolved and promised to show it, and he takes delight in it, and many are the instances of it:
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon; God is to be applied unto, not as an absolute God, or out of Christ; but as our God in Christ, in whom he has proclaimed his name, a God gracious and merciful, and so he does abundantly pardon. The promise of pardon is absolute and unconditional, and is here observed as the motive to forsake sin, and not that as the condition of pardon; the design is to comfort those that are distressed with sin; God does and will pardon, and none but he can, and he has declared that he will; forgiveness is with him, and it is published in the Gospel, and there have been many instances of it.
The Lord does abundantly pardon, or “multiply to pardon” m; he pardons all sorts of sinners, and all sorts of sins; original sin, actual sins and transgressions; all backslidings and revoltings; all but the sin against the Holy Ghost.
m “multiplicabit ad parcendum vel ut parcat”, Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus; “multiplicabit condonare”, Cocceius; “multus erit ut proritietur”: Munster.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
7. Let the wicked man forsake his way. He confirms the former statement; for, having formerly called men to receive the grace of God, he now describes more largely the manner of receiving it. We know how hypocrites loudly call on God whenever they desire relief from their distresses, and yet shut up their hearts by wicked obstinacy; (86) and therefore, that the Jews may not be hypocritical in seeking God, he exhorts them to sincere piety. Hence we infer that the doctrine of repentance ought always to accompany the promise of salvation; for in no other way can men taste the goodness of God than by abhorring themselves on account of their sins, and renouncing themselves and the world. And indeed no man will sincerely desire to be reconciled to God and to obtain pardon of sins till he is moved by a true and earnest repentance.
By three forms of expression he describes the nature of repentance, — first, “Let the wicked man forsake, his way;” secondly, “The unrighteous man his thoughts;” thirdly, “Let him return to the Lord.” Under the word way he includes the whole course of life, and accordingly demands that they bring forth the fruits of righteousness as witnesses of their newness of life. By adding the word thoughts he intimates that we must not only correct outward actions, but must begin with the heart; for although in the opinion of men we appear to change our manner of life for the better, yet we shall have made little proficiency if the heart be not changed.
Thus repentance embraces a change of the whole man; for in man we view inclinations, purposes, and then works. The works of men are visible, but the root within is concealed. This must first be changed, that it may afterwards yield fruitful works. We must first wash away from the mind all uncleanness, and conquer wicked inclinations, that outward testimonies may afterwards be added. And if any man boast that he has been changed, and yet live as he was wont to do, it will be vain-boasting; for both are requisite, conversion of the heart, and change of life.
Besides, God does not command us to return to him before he has applied a remedy to revolt; for hypocrites will willingly endure that we praise what is good and right, provided that they be at liberty to crouch amidst their filth. But we can have nothing to do with God if we do not withdraw from ourselves, especially when we have been alienated by wicked variance; and therefore self-denial goes before, that it may lead us to God.
And he will have mercy on him. We ought carefully to examine this context, for he shows that men cannot be led to repentance in any other way than by holding out assurance of pardon. Whoever, then, inculcates the doctrine of repentance, without mentioning the mercy of God and reconciliation through free grace, labors to no purpose; just as the Popish doctors imagine that they have discharged their duty well when they have dwelt largely on this point, and yet do but chatter and trifle about the doctrine of repentance. But although they taught the true method of repenting, yet it would be of little avail, seeing that they leave out the foundation of freelybestowed pardon, by which alone consciences can be pacified. And indeed, as we have formerly said, a sinner will always shrink from the presence of God so long as he is dragged to his judgment-seat to give an account of his life, and will never be subdued to fear and obedience till his heart is brought into a state of peace.
For he aboundeth in pardoning. Now, because it is difficult to remove terror from trembling minds, Isaiah draws all argument from the nature of God, that he will be ready to pardon and to be reconciled. Thus the Holy Spirit dwells on this part of doctrine, because we always doubt whether or not God is willing to pardon us; for, although we entertain some thoughts of his mercy, yet we do not venture fully to believe that, it belongs to us. It is not without reason, therefore, that this clause is added, that we may not be hindered by uncertainty or doubt as to his infinite compassion toward us.
(86) “ Par une obstination mechante.”
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
MANS ABILITY TO TURN TO GOD AND BELIEVE THE GOSPEL
Isa. 55:7. Let the wicked forsake his way, &c.
God has done and is doing, in the work of Christ and in the work of the Holy Spirit, all that is needful for the salvation of every child of Adam, and having done this He now commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the Gospel. That man is able to turn to God and believe the Gospel is evident from the following considerations:
I. The distinction between the work of God and the work of man in conversion. A clear distinction between them is manifest from what God is said to do, and what man is required to do. God says that He will teach man in the way he should go; mans work is to learn of God, &c In short, Gods work is to enlighten, to renew, to beget, to change the heart, to turn man to Himself; mans work is to hear, to repent, to believe, to turn to God. Hence it is that conversion is ascribed sometimes to God, and sometimes to man; sometimes to the Word, and sometimes to the sinner himself. And all this accords with the nature of the case. [1692]
[1692] Suppose a traveller is on a wrong road, and another calls him to turn, and he believes and obeys the call. What then? The other turned him, his word turned him, and he turned himself. There is no contradiction here. So in conversion. God calls all men to turn from their wicked ways; one hears and obeys the call. What then? God turned him, His word turned him, and he turned himself. Suppose the traveller refused to hear and believe the call, he would not have turned. So, in like manner, if the sinner refuse to hear and obey the call of God, he is not converted; God does not turn him, because he would not turn. In what sense the work of the fall was Satans, the work of conversion is Gods; in what sense the work of the fall was our first parents, the work of conversion is mans.Johnston.
II. Conversion to God is a duty required of man. Conversion is a command binding upon all men. God commands all men to turn to Himself. Is not man bound to obey the moment God calls? Every moment he refuses, he is adding to his rebellion and guilt. But if man cannot turn to God, he cannot obey the call, nor is he bound to obey; and consequently, he is not guilty of disobedience should he not turn. It is impossible to prove mans guilt in not being converted, and deny his ability to turn to God. Nothing could be more striking and remarkable than the words of Eze. 18:30-32; Eze. 33:11. See also Act. 3:19, Repent and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out; or more properly, Change your mind and turn, that your sins may be blotted out. To change the mind is the same as to make a new heart and a new spirit. And surely man can change his mind when God shows him something capable of working a change. Man can change his mind regarding anything he learns from man; and surely he can change his mind regarding what he learns from God. The words, be converted in this verse, ought to be simply turn.
III. God never requires impossibilities. He requires and commands man to turn to Him, but if man cannot do so, then He requires an impossibility, a thing which God cannot do. God requires man to love Him with all his heart, and soul, and mind, and his neighbour as himself; but He requires no man to love Him more than with all his might; that is, more than he is able: nor his neighbour more than Himself. [1695]
[1695] We refer to this both as an apt illustration, and because some entertain the most extraordinary notion that this is an instance of Gods requiring of man an impossibility. Such a notion is a positive slight against the character of God. We are told that man is fallen and depraved; true, but still God does not require man to love Him beyond the strength which He has given him. The word is with all thy might, not beyond thy might. There can be only two cases in which man cannot turn to God and believe in Jesus. The one is the case of those who have not the truththe means by which God turns man to Himself. The other is the case of those who have not faculties of mind capable of understanding and receiving the truth.
The former are destitute of objective ability; the latter of subjective ability, without both of which it is impossible to believe in Jesus. Any man who comes under one or other of these cases will never be punished for unbelief. This is plainly taught by our Lord, in Joh. 9:41; Joh. 15:22-24. All those, therefore, who have the truth, the gospel, and the facultymind, are able to turn to God and believe in Jesus. God commands them to do so, and He will not command what is not duty; and that cannot be duty to a man which the man is not able to do. It is not a blind mans duty to see; nor a deaf mans to hear; no more is it the duty of man to believe if he cannot believe. Our Saviour frequently alludes to this very thought, when He so often says, He who hath ears to hear, let him hear. And mark how He remonstrates with His disciples (Mar. 8:18).Johnston.
IV. Conversion requires resolute determination. If a man is not determined, he will never turn to God. Nothing is more necessary to conversion than earnestness and resolution; and perhaps nothing is a greater hindrance than want of decision. Many allow the religion of Jesus to be a good thing, and absolutely necessary to salvation, yet for want of manfully making up their minds, they live and die unconverted. Nothing could more clearly show mans activity in his own conversion, and his ability to turn to God. The necessity of resolution is clearly seen from the following Scriptures: Lam. 3:40-41; Hos. 5:4; these verses show what man wants in order to his conversion. Let him only search and try his ways, &c. But no, he does not like this. Here is the reason why he does not turn. It is not because he is not able. Our Saviour shows the necessity of resolution, when He says, Strive, &c. Mark the difference between seeking and striving; agonize, as the Greek has it. Now if man has nothing to do in his own conversion, if he is unable to turn to God, if he is as passive as a stone, such an exhortation has no meaning; the half of the Bible becomes meaningless. [1698]
[1698] The prodigal son affords a pleasing illustration of resolution, and of mans ability to turn to God. The rich young man is an affecting illustration of the fatal consequences of wanting resolution. He came to our Lord, asking what he must do to inherit eternal life; yet when he found that he must sell all which he had and follow Jesus, he was not ready to make such a sacrifice. The truth is, his mind was not made up to have eternal life at all costs; and, for want of this resolution, he lost all. What a fatal choice! Will you make the same, or resolve, come what will, to have eternal life?Johnston.
V. Unconverted Gospel hearers are those and those only who refuse to turn to God at His call. This refusal is the only reason why every Gospel hearer is not a Christian, &c. Men harden their hearts lest they should turn, and God should save them. [1701]
[1701] This is evident from our Lords quotation from Isaiah, in Mat. 13:15. Paul also quotes the same words as being the reason why the Jews at Rome believed not his preaching (Act. 28:17). Those who hear the Word and are not converted, are those only who put it away from them, judging themselves unworthy of everlasting life, as Paul told the Jews at Antioch (Act. 13:46). Those who hearths Word, and turn to God, are those and those only who take it to themselves, and are bent upon everlasting life at all hazards. The manner in which some account for the difference between gospel hearers, ascribing it to election and the sovereign withholding or bestowing of a special influence, arises from mistaken views of Scripture statements, and is utterly subversive of the responsibility of man. We believe that upon no other view of the case than that which we have stated can the calls and invitations of the Gospel, and the promises and threatenings attached to them, have any meaning or consistency. Mark the words of the glorious invitation in Isa. 55:1-7. In the same manner we might examine all the calls, promises, and threatenings of the gospel; all teaching the same thingmans duty, ability, and consequent responsibility. What is the difference between him who believeth, and him who believeth not (Joh. 3:18; Joh. 3:36)? But if the sinner is not able to believe, these promises and threatenings have no consistency. But no, the sinner who believes not is righteously condemned, because he is able to believe, but stubbornly refuses to obey God.Johnston.
Conclusion.What is your state? Have you believed on the Lord Jesus? Have you forsaken your evil ways and thoughts and turned to God? If so, happy are you; your sins are all forgiven; eternal life is yours. But if not, except you repent, &c., there is nothing for you but everlasting woe. Let me ask you: why have you not believed? Do you think you are unable? How strange that you should be able to believe man, and not be able to believe God! &c. Awake, thou that sleepest, &c.F. Johnston: The Work of God and Man in Conversion, pp. 110124.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
DISCOURSE: 984
ENCOURAGEMENT TO TURN TO GOD
Isa 55:7. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
WE may discern many of the attributes of the Deity, as wisdom, power, and goodness, in the works of creation: but it is from the book of revelation only that we obtain the knowledge of his mercy. The Heathen indeed entertain some faint ideas that God will pardon them; though they know not how to approach him with acceptance, nor have any assurance that they shall find acceptance with him. But we are invited by God himself to come unto him, and are encouraged by an express promise that he will pardon even the vilest of returning prodigals.
In the words before us, we may see,
I.
Our duty
All of us by nature are in a state of departure from God, and of subjection to sin. Hence our duty is,
1.
To forsake our sins
[Every one has some way which he has marked out for himself; some way that is suited to his age, his education, his circumstances in life, or his constitutional propensities. Some are addicted to open vice; others to a more decent species of gaiety; others to the pursuit of riches; others to the more refined, though not less destructive, gratifications of literary pride; while others again regard nothing but their ease, and the indulgence of their peculiar habits. But whatever be our ways, if they be not such as are prescribed in the Scripture, and such as lead directly to heaven, they must be forsaken. We may indeed, and must, attend to our earthly duties; but in them, as well as in our religious exercises, we must seek the glory of God, and the salvation of our souls.
We must moreover forsake our thoughts. Even they who are most correct in their conduct, will find abundant matter for humiliation in their thoughts. What proud thoughts arise even from their supposed superiority to others! What vain, angry, envious, worldly, covetous, impure, and unbelieving thoughts lodge within us all, and find a welcome reception in our hearts! These then, no less than our ways, must be forsaken: we must watch and pray against them, and labour to have our minds occupied with holy and heavenly contemplations.]
2.
To turn unto our God
[As it is from God that we have departed, so it is unto God that we must return: nor will any reformation of our lives, or even renovation of our hearts, avail us, if this further change be not accomplished within us.
We must turn to him in humility. All of us, without exception, are guilty before God. Let us, even the best amongst us, only mark what our thoughts most easily recur to, and what they fix upon with the greatest frequency and delight, in those seasons when there is nothing particular to engage them, and we shall find no great cause for self-preference and self-complacency, Such a view of ourselves would shew us what we are before Him who searcheth the heart and trieth the reins; and would convince us that we need to abase ourselves before him with self-lothing and self-abhorrence.
We must also turn to him in faith. There is but one Mediator between God and man, whose merits and intercession must be the only grounds of our hope. In him, even in the Lord Jesus Christ, we must trust: we must make mention of his name and of his righteousness, even his only: and we must believe that God, for his sake, is willing to accept the very chief of sinners.
We must yet further turn to him in an unreserved devotedness both of heart and life. Mark, how entirely the heart of an unregenerate man gives itself to the world! Not that he never engages in religious duties; but, whatever he does, his affections are set upon things below, and not on things above. The very reverse of this is our duty: we are not to be so occupied with heavenly pursuits, as to neglect the duties of our place and station; but, in the midst of all our earthly occupations, God must have our hearts: his command must be the reason, his word the rule, and his honour the end, of all our actions. To fulfil his will, and enjoy his presence, should be the one object of our lives.]
Nor shall we decline this duty, if we consider what the text proposes for,
II.
Our encouragement
God will shew mercy to returning penitents
[If it were doubtful whether our efforts would prove effectual for our salvation, we should not readily undertake the work of mortifying sin, and of turning unto God. But there is no doubt: for God delighteth in the exercise of mercy: judgment is his strange work, to which he is utterly averse: he willeth not the death of any sinner, but rather that he should turn from his wickedness and live. He invites us and expostulates with us in the most tender manner, Turn ye: turn ye! why will ye die? Wilt thou not be made clean? O, when shall it once be? Let but the assurances of mercy which the Scripture affords to penitent sinners be considered, and no one will want a motive for abandoning his sins, and for returning to his God.]
He will abundantly pardon transgressions, however multiplied they may have been
[They whom iniquities have been heinous and long-continued, are apt to despond, and to imagine themselves beyond the reach of mercy. But none need to despair: Gods mercy is infinite: though our sins may have been numerous as the sands upon the sea-shore, his mercies will far exceed them: as the heaven in high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. See what sinners have been forgiven! mark the transgressions of David, Manasseh, Peter, and others; see the peculiar aggravations of their guilt! and then say whether God will not multiply his pardons to the very utmost extent of our necessities? After such a view of Gods mercy, our hearts must be harder than adamant, if we refuse to repent, and to turn unto him.]
AddressTo those who,
1.
Presume upon Gods mercy
[You are at ease, because God is merciful: but are his mercies ever promised to those who live and die in sin? Are
not rather his judgments denounced against them? Search the Scriptures, and see if you can find one word to comfort those who persist in wilful impenitence: alas! you will soon find to your cost, that, as God is merciful to repenting sinners, so will he fulfil the declaration, that except ye repent, ye shall all perish.]
2.
Limit it
[Satans first device for the retaining of sinners under his dominion is, to represent God to them as a Being who it too merciful to punish them. His next endeavour is, to make them believe that their sins are too great to be forgiven, and that there is not mercy enough in the heart of God to pardon such transgressors as they. But, if any of us are tempted to entertain such thoughts of the Deity, let us only reflect upon the words of the text, and the many passages of Scripture which illustrate and confirm them, and we shall see at once the folly and impiety of limiting his mercies. Let such persons at least put the matter to a trial; and they shall find, by sweet experience, that whatsoever cometh unto him, he will in no wise cast out.]
3.
Abuse it
[Are there those in the world, who, because they have obtained mercy (as they think), are remiss in working out their salvation? Are there those who imagine, that, because they have once overcome the world, they may be again entangled therein, and overcome by it, without any danger to their souls? Let them know, that they are fatally deluded; and that, if they do not awake from their stupor, their last end will be worse than their beginning. If the mercy of God do not stimulate us to an unfeigned renunciation of all sin, and an unremitting activity in his service, we shall in vain hope that it shall be exercised towards us in the day of judgment.]
4.
Enjoy it
[What reason have you to admire and adore the goodness of your God! O, let a lively sense of it be ever on your minds. Be meditating daily how you shall most acceptably express your gratitude towards him. Labour to glorify him to the uttermost. Commend him to your fellow-sinners. Let your ways be such as shall be well-pleasing in his sight. Let your thoughts be devoutly occupied in praises and thanksgivings to him. And let your fellowship with him become daily more sweet, more intimate, and more abiding. Thus shall his mercy, which has already abounded towards you, be displayed in yet richer communications to all eternity.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
Isa 55:7 Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
Ver. 7. Let the wicked forsake his way. ] Or else never think of finding favour with God, or of calling upon him to any purpose. The leper’s lips should be covered according to the law: a good motion from an ill mouth will never take with God.
“ Pura Deus mens est, pura vult mente vocari:
Et puras iussit pondus habere preces. ”
And the unrighteous man his thoughts.
And let him return unto the Lord.
For he will abundantly pardon.
a Epist. 7, Ad Venant.
b Acts and Mon., 109.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
wicked = lawless man (singular) Hebrew. rasha’, App-44.
forsake. See note on Isa 1:4.
way . . . thoughts. Note the Introversion of lines in verses: Isa 55:7 and Isa 8:7 -. way. -7. thoughts. 8-. thoughts. -8. ways.
unrighteous. Hebrew. ‘aven. App-44.
man. Hebrew ‘ish. App-14.
abundantly pardon. Hebrew multiply to pardon.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Abundant Pardon
Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the Lord, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon.Isa 55:7.
The Prophet had been commissioned to carry a message to the captive Jews who sat by the waters of Babylon and wept when they remembered Zion. The message was that, heinous as their iniquity had been, their iniquity was pardoned; and that to the merciful and relenting heart of Jehovah it seemed as if they had already endured double for all their sins, i.e. twice as much as their sins had deserved. Hence he was about to appear for them, to appear among themdelivering them from their captivity, bringing them back with song and dance to their native land, making them the joy and praise of the whole earth. In this word, this message, God was drawing near to them; finding them, that they might find Him. And the Prophet urges them to seek Him while He may be found, to call upon Him while He is near; that is to say, now that God is approaching them to deliver them, they are to fit themselves to receive, to recognise, and to follow Him, by putting away their unrighteous thoughts, by forsaking their wicked ways, and by turning in penitence, expectation, and faith toward Him who was turning toward them in truth and compassion.
But sinful men, especially when they are suffering the bitter punishment of their sins, are apt to be hopeless men. When you speak to them of the Mercy that is more than all their sins, they are apt to think that Mercy incredible, or at least to doubt whether it is about to be shown to them. As nothing is possible to doubt and despair, as above all the energy of active moral exertion is impossible, God sets Himself to remove the natural incredulity and hopelessness of the men He was about to save. That His mercy is incredible, He admits; but He affirms that it is incredible only in the sense of being incredibly larger and better than they imagine it to be. They might have found it impossible to forgive those who had sinned against them as they had sinned against Him. But, pleads God, My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways. They are a whole heaven above them. And, therefore, I can forgive you the sins which you could not have forgiven had they been committed against you. Nay, your very unbelief cannot limit or defeat My mercy. The word I have sent you, this message of salvation and deliverance, must do the errand on which I sent it; and therefore you must and will go out of the house of your captivity with joy, and be led forth with peace, the mountains and the little hills breaking forth into singing as you climb them, and all the trees of the field clapping their hands as you march through and under them. So that the main point of these verses is not so much that God Himself is unknowable to us, as that His mercy is incredible to usincredibly higher, incredibly deeper and wider, incredibly more heavenly and inexhaustible, incredibly more affluent, and tender, and sweet; in fine, as high above our conceptions of it as the heavens above the earth, and so broad that it embraces the whole world of men as the heavens embrace the earth with all its mountains and woods and seas.
This old admonition falls upon modern ears like the once familiar, but half-forgotten, cadence of a song. Time was when such a scripture roused the deepest emotions and brought the sweetest peace to human hearts. Such texts were, within the memory of man, the characteristic foundation of all evangelical sermons. The old-fashioned gospel invitation had an imperativeness, a fine entreaty, which netted magnificent results for the visible Kingdom of God. Men groaned in spirit and fairly ran to Christian altars lest the Divine invitation should be withdrawn. But the old appeal fails to stir men as formerly. Like some quaint hymn or ballad, kept as a sort of relic among the more dashing modern music, this old Bible melody is apparently outclassed by the more philosophical compositions of our day.1 [Note: G. C. Peck, Old Sins in New Clothes, p. 211.]
There are five things in the text. Three we are to do, and two God promises to do. The three which we are asked to do are (1) to forsake our wicked way, (2) to forsake our thoughts, and (3) to turn unto the Lord. The two God promises to do are (1) to have mercy upon us, and (2) to pardon us abundantly.
I
What we are told to do
1. The wicked is called upon or invited to forsake his way. That is, he is called upon to give up his sinful habits. Is he dishonest? He is to give up his dishonesty. Is he profligate in his life? He is to give up his profligacy. Is he addicted to intemperance? He is to give up his unsober practices. Is he a profane swearer? He is to give up his oaths. Does he speak what is not the truth? He is to give up his falsehoods. Does he break the Sabbath? He is to give up his Sabbath-breaking. Does he neglect Divine ordinances? He is to give up that neglect. From all his evil ways he is to turn: he is to forsake them, as Israel forsook Egypt, when he crossed the Red Sea; as Ruth forsook Moab, when she went with her mother-in-law to the land of Israel.
The best way for a man is the way which God has made for him. He that made us knows what He made us for, and He knows by what means we may best arrive at that end. According to Divine teaching, as gracious as it is certain, we learn that the way of eternal life is Jesus Christ. Christ Himself says, I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; and he that would pursue life after a right fashion must look to Jesus, and must continue looking to Jesus, not only as the Author, but as the Finisher of his faith. It shall be to him a golden rule of life, when he has chosen Christ to be his way, to let his eyes look right on, and his eyelids straight before him. He need not be afraid to contemplate the end of that way, for the end of the way of Christ is life and glory with Christ for ever. It doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is. A friend said to me the other day, How happy are we to know that whatever happens to us in this life it is well! Yes, I added, and to know that if this life ends it is equally well, or better. Then we joined hands in common joy to think that we were equally ready for life or death, and did not need five minutes anxiety as to whether it should be the one or the other. When you are on the Kings highway, and that way is a perfectly straight one, you may go ahead without fear, and sing on the road.1 [Note: C. H. Spurgeon, The Messiah, p. 425.]
2. But the wicked man is not merely to forsake his way, he is to forsake his thoughts. You see, one may, from prudential motives, give up outwardly an evil way, without any change within. From mere self-interest an evil-speaking man may hold his tongue, and yet his thoughts and feelings be as unkind and malicious as ever. From mere self-interest, from regard to his bodily health or his worldly interests, a profligate man may restrain his appetites, and yet his thoughts be still impure. But a mere outward reformation has no value in the eyes of the heart-searching One. There must be forsaking of sin inwardly; there must be a hating of it, and a giving it up in the thoughts and intents of the soul. The fountain, from which the bitter waters flow, must be stopped. The root, from which spring the poison fruits, must be plucked up.
In the third century a great wave of monasticism swept the Church. Men wooed the life of solitude and contemplation, and thought by such a life to escape their evil thoughts. But history testifies to the vanity of such a hope. One of the Church Fathers, Basil, after having sought peace in the quiet of the desert, writes to his friend Gregory, I have abandoned my life in town, as one sure to lead to countless ills; but I have not yet been able to get quit of myself. I am like travellers at sea, who have never gone a voyage before, and are distressed and seasick, who quarrel with the ship because it is so big and makes such a tossing, and when they get out of it into the pinnace or dingey, are everywhere and always seasick and distressed. Wherever they go, their nausea and misery go with them. My state is something like this. I carry my own troubles with me, and so everywhere I am in the midst of similar discomforts. So in the end I have not got much good out of my solitude (Basil, Ep. ii.). As Basil suggests, the only way is a mortification of the passions, and such mortification can come about only by a new birth, a return unto the Lord. If we ask what conditions best favour such regeneration, we are answered by the life of Jesus, which was not one of solitude alone, nor one of activity alone, but a life in which prayer and contemplation alternated with active service.
Putting the matter broadly and generally: what are the thoughts from which the sin life, in its various outward forms, comes? They are chiefly wrong thoughts about God, about sin, about true happiness. Well, those wrong thoughts about God, as if He were so great that He will not concern Himself about us, or so merciful that He will never punish us, or so dreadful in His holiness that He will never pardon us; those thoughts must be forsaken. And those thoughts about sin, as if it were no great thing, as if it were easily got over, as if it were little more than a sort of unhappy necessity, instead of a tremendous evil separating the soul from the Most High and making the sinner liable to His wrath and curse; those thoughts must be forsaken. And those thoughts about mans happiness, as if it consisted in the abundance of the things which he possesses, in earthly honour and prosperity, and not in heart-love and heart-devotion to God and His Son; those thoughts must be forsaken. That whole course of thinking, feeling, hoping, doing, which springs from natures awful unbelief, must be given up in deep dislike and real abasement.
I remember when we were in Glasgow there was a business man converted, and he was very anxious for all his employs to be converted, and he brought them one after another, and they were blessed. But one man he could not get. He said, If I am going to be converted I am going to be by the regular stated means. Scotland had got regular churches, and he did not need Americans to come and tell him how to be saved, and he would not come. We went up to the North of Scotland, and the employer had some business to transact there, and he sent that man, and one night we were preaching on the banks of a river, and I was speaking on this text, I thought. This man saw the crowd, and he thought he would like to see what was going on, and the text reached his attentionI thought. He listened, and the arrow of conviction went down into his soul, and the man was convicted. Then he began to inquire who was the preacher, and he found out that it was this same preacher that he would not hear in Glasgow.1 [Note: D. L. Moody.]
3. Thus much the prophet teaches us on the negative side, as to what is to be turned from; he goes next to the positive side, and teaches us what is to be turned to. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord. That is implied, of course, in any true turning from sinful ways and thoughts; without that it would be no true turning from them. Yet it conveys a distinct thought; it brings before us another and spiritual aspect of the truth. And sometimes you may seem to have a large fulfilment to the call to forsake ways and thoughts; and yet there may be no returning to God. That was the case with the Jews of old. They forsook their idolatrous ways most thoroughly; the outward idols were cast utterly away; the names and images of Baal and Molech became their horror and detestation. Even in thought they gave up their old idolatry. That is, they thought it wrong; they disapproved of it; they regarded it with hatred and loathing. And yet they did not return to God.
And what does it mean? It evidently means the soul coming back to the views and feelings it had about God before it went away from Him. Let him return unto the Lord; it is just as though it had been said, Let the Lord Jehovah be to him what He was before the fall. And what was God to man then? God was to man unfallen the Object of his profound homage. He worshipped and adored Him. God was to man unfallen the Object of his supremest love, his Portion, his Delight; in all the attributes of this Divine character he had supreme complacency; dear to him was the righteousness of the Highest, the love, the wisdom, the power. God was to man unfallen the Object of his trust and confidence. God was to man unfallen the King of his heart and his life; His will and glory the end of mans existence. And the returning of the soul to the Lord is the souls returning to a vital consciousness of God as the great loving One, is the souls returning to a sense of His infinite majesty and excellence, and desiring to live with Him as before, in love, adoration, trust, submission.
There are three stumbling-stones in mans way to Christsin, his own thoughts, and his own way or his own will; and you will find that every man has got to meet and overcome these three obstacles, or, as some one else has put it, three stumbling-stoneshuman righteousness, human religion, and human wisdom. There is a great deal of religion in the world to-day. A man may be full of religion and yet be a stranger to the grace of God. You will find some of the worst of men in the community are very religious; they have got a religion of their own. You talk with them about Christ, and about His Kingdom, and they will straighten up and tell you that they would not give up their religion for all the world; but if you press them upon this point of giving up their sins, you will find they are not willing to part with sin. Now mans religion is not worth much if it does not bring him away from his sins. If a man is not willing to forsake his sins, to turn his back upon his past life and his past sins, he cannot be the disciple of Jesus Christ. I have heard men say often, Why is it Jesus Christ has got so few disciples? The Gospel has been preached eighteen hundred years, and yet Muhammad has got more disciples than Jesus Christ. The question is very easily answered. A man can be a follower of Muhammad and not give up his sins; a man can follow the doctrines of Confucius and not give up his sins; but the reason Jesus Christ has so few disciples is that men are not willing to part with their sins. That is the trouble, that is the difficulty. If men could only get into the Kingdom of God without giving up anything, a great many would flock into the Kingdom, they would rush into the Kingdom by the thousand; but it is this giving up our sins, forsaking our thoughts and our waythat is the difficulty.1 [Note: D. L. Moody.]
Repentance
Now let us consider what repentance is, and what it is not.
(1) It is not fear. A man may be frightened, scared, and yet not repent. That has very often occurred at sea during a storm. When a storm sweeps over the ocean it brings about a great many strange things. You will find when talking to sea captains that a great many men become suddenly pious, men who have been blaspheming for years suddenly begin to pray, and you would think them very religious and repentant, but when the storm has passed over these men go on swearing again. That is only fear.
(2) Then repentance is not feeling; a man may have much feeling, and yet not repent. That may sound strange, but it is clearly taught in Scripture. You go down to yonder prison, and you cannot find a man who is not sorry that he is there; but their trouble is simply because they have got caught, they feel very bad because they were unlucky; but let them out of prison and they will do the same over again. That is not repentance. A man may have a good deal of feeling, and weep bitterly for days, and yet not repent. So that it is not feeling or remorse. Judas had that, plenty of it, so that he put an end to his existence; and a man may be filled with remorse and not repent.
The confession I have sinned is made by hardened Pharaoh (Exo 9:27), double-minded Balaam (Num 22:34), remorseful Achan (Jos 7:20), insincere King Saul (1Sa 15:24), despairing Judas (Mat 27:4); but in none of these cases was there true repentance.1 [Note: A. H. Strong, Syst. Theology, iii. p. 832.]
(3) Nor is it conviction. A man may be deeply convicted when he is going out of the house of God; he may know that his whole life is wrong, his conscience may lash him and smite him, and he may say, My whole life is dark and black. He may be deeply convicted and yet not repent. Conviction is not repentance; making a few resolutions is not repentance; turning over a new leaf, as some men say they are going to do, that is not repentance; nor is it found in good feelings or good thoughts.
A fit of sorrow is no great thing. Who has not had that? There are persons upon whom a penitential mood comes and comes and comes again; and nothing results from it. But this forsaking of the thoughts goes deep into the soul, and means a turning of the whole being towards God. It is quite true that the Bible does not lay stress on mere effervescence of feeling, as if it were needful to pour out floods of tears, or utter cries of agony, or go mourning and grieving for any special number of hours or days, and with any special intensity. Yet it is not conceivable that you should have a person convinced on the matter of his salvation, and changing his thoughts about God and sin, without strong feelings of abasement and shame. Take the type of a penitent, as Jesus gives it. See the publican standing afar off, not lifting so much as his eyes to heaven, smiting upon his breast. There is nothing extravagant in that.
Behold us, how we feebly float,
Through many a changing mood;
How oft one flash of thought annuls
Our firmest choice of good.
We sin, repent, and fondly think
Our will is now made strong;
Our state of grace, restored, abides
Thou knowest, Lord, how long.2 [Note: W. Bright.]
(4) What is it? Repentance is turning from. That is what repentance is. Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die, O house of Israel? It is an afterthought, it is a change of mind. You ask how long a person is to feel sorry for his sins. Long enough to give them upthat is all. A man may have deep sorrow or he may not have much, but he has made up his mind that he is going to turn from his sins to God.1 [Note: D. L. Moody.]
Because I knew not when my life was good,
And when there was a light upon my path,
But turned my soul perversely to the dark
Because I held upon my selfish road,
And left my brother wounded by the way,
And called ambition duty, and pressed on
Because I spent the strength Thou gavest me
In struggle which Thou never didst ordain,
And have but dregs of life to offer Thee
O Lord, I do repent.2 [Note: S. Williams.]
II
What God promises to do
The two things which God promises to do are (1) have mercy, and (2) abundantly pardon.
1. The Lord, it is said, will have mercy on the returning sinner. It is not out of consideration of the wicked mans turning from his sin, or in reward for his heart-turning to the Most High, that his guilt shall be cancelled, and he shall be reinstated in the Divine favour. There is no idea of right connected with this penitential return. What he will get, he will get in mercyin simple mercy. He is still liable to righteous punishment. But mercy will be his. God will not exact His dues. God, for the sake of His own glory, and in His beloved Son, in Him who died the Just for the unjust, will freely and graciously stay the sentence which sin has merited.
We do not like the word mercy. It is humbling; it lays pride and self-righteousness in the dust. Mercy, all of mercy. It is very humbling. Nor, perhaps, do we best reconcile men to it by dilating on their helpless, hopeless state. The soul will be sometimes stout against any measure of that. Crush me, to atoms if you will, but I will not yield. Rather should the sinner get quit of a delusion. It is a noble thing, is it not, in an earthly sovereign to be merciful? The earthly king is never more glorious in our eyes than when he does some great deed of mercy. And is it not felt, too, to be a noble thing when the criminal or offender, in loving penitence, gracefully and thankfully accepts the mercy? In such an acceptance he is not degraded, but exalted. And so let the sinner quit his sins, return to God, accept His mercy, not merely as though he cannot help it, as a heartrending necessity, but with loving and adoring gratitude; for what it is so glorious and blessed in God to give, it is blessed in him to receive. And look if there be any semblance of exultation over him in his abasement in the gracious Fathers countenance. Nay, the very opposite. Can He have any thoughts of degrading him whom He would clasp in His arms and call His son?
The Mercy of God, viewed as saving men from evil thoughts and wayswhich is the only true mercyis simply incredible: so the prophet affirms, so we profess to think and to believe. But do we really believe it? Do we act as if we did? Millions will say to-day: I believe in the forgiveness of sins; but how many of that vast multitude, do you suppose, will both understand and realise what they say? Many of them hardly believe that they have sins which need a great act of Divine forgiveness. Many more do not know that, in order to forgive, God must punish their sins.
One of James Lane Allens later books has for its title the creed of its hero, The Reign of Law. That was all he could see in the universe: unpitying law; law irreversible and conscienceless. The world order was to him, and presumably to the author of the book, a heartless procession of events. There was no Face to meet his advances or to frown away his sin. But, as his heart began to break up under the suns and frosts of love; as the power of a new truth got hold of him, he looked up into heaven to whisper at length: Ah, Gabrielle, it is love that makes a man believe in a God of love. Not that God is ever capricious, but that His heart can go forth in special overtures to His children; not that He ever really hides His face, but that it sometimes breaks like the conquering sun through our earth-mists; not that He ever ceases to call, but that sometimes His voice has new resonance and musicthis is our Christian faith.
2. But this leads us to the other point in the prophets word: He will abundantly pardon. There is nothing of cold, distant harshness in Gods mercy-giving. He does not say, Take thy pardon and go thy way. It is what thou dost not deserve. Thou hast been a wicked rebel; take care of thyself in time to come. God is ever like Himself. Behold Him in creation; in these myriads of mighty worlds He has hung above us in the heavens. How like the greatness of the Great One is that fulness of immensity. Behold Him in the gifts with which He blesses our earth; with what a lavish hand He scatters beauties and glories. And here, too, as the God of pardon, God again is like Himself; He pardons like Himself, with Divine generosity.
(1) It is Gods good pleasure to pardon abundantly.
This man, whoever he was, has a claim to speak of God with an authority which few can rival. And this is what he has to say to us of Godthat Gods mercy is as much higher than our thoughts of it, as much broader, as much more pure and tender, as the heavens are higher and broader and sweeter than the earth: that it transcends all our conceptions of mercy, that it seems incredible to us only because it is so large and rich and free, that we can hardly even bring ourselves to believe in it. He affirms that even here our great poets description holds good, that we may lift a reverent eye to the very Throne of Heaven and say: Mercy is twice blessed, blessing him that gives, as well as him that takes, since God delights in mercy, and isif we may speak of so great a mystery in words so homelyat least as pleased to forgive our sins as we are to have them forgiven.
(2) Its abundance is due to His excellence.
If we doubt whether He means to the full what He saysif we doubt whether He is in earnest in calling such as we are to come to Him, whether He can pardon as abundantly as man has sinnedhere is the answer to our unbelief: He does not work by the rules and manners of men. His ways are not our ways, nor His thoughts our thoughts. He shows His desire for our salvation, and His readiness to accept us, in doing what none could have imagined possible, in sending His Son to take our nature upon Him, and to become man for our sakes. Here is the pledge of His faithfulness. Here is the assurance which none can doubt, that He loves the souls of men with the love with which He loves His only-begotten Son. When we will not come to Him, He comes to us. When we refuse to seek Him, He comes Himself to seek and to save us. He does not send, He does not call merely. He comes down from heaven, and lays aside His glory, and speaks to us face to face, with the words of man, with the fellow-feeling of man, with the affectionate love and tender earnestness of man. He who made the light, and rules beyond the stars, comes and calls on us, and speaks to us with the simple plainness with which a father speaks to his little children, or a little child appeals to grown men.
(3) And especially to His greater knowledge.
God is more forgiving than man; where the justice which only half knows the magnitude of the offence is often merciless, the justice which sees it in all its heinousness is ready to pardon; even where all hope of clemency from a mortal weak and erring as himself, is gone; to Him who knows no sin, who is absolutely inaccessible to temptation, may the forlorn and guilty soul repair with the assurance that its appeal for mercy will never be heard in vain. It is just because Gods thoughts and ways are not as mans, because His righteousness is infinitely exalted above mans, that therefore the unrighteous man may return unto the Lord with the assurance that He will have mercy upon him, and to our God with the confidence that He will abundantly pardon.
My Lord, when Thou didst love me, didst Thou know
How weak my efforts were, how few,
Tepid to love and impotent to do,
Envious to reap while slack to sow?
Yea, I knew.1 [Note: Christina G. Rossetti.]
(4) It is expressed in His very Name.
In the effort that was put forth by the prophets of old to give the wings of words to the Divine Inspiration that stirred within them, and more particularly to give the divinest expression to their conception of the character of God, they hit upon nothing that is finer, or grander, or more instructive than the terms in which they represent the name of God. It must indeed be difficult to name God, if the name is to be adequately significant. Hence the accumulation of grand human terms in the name of the Lord as proclaimed to Moses of old:The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth; keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, and transgression, and sin, and that will by no means clear the impenitent.
The penitent Levites, of whom we read in the Book of Nehemiah, thus spoke to God: Thou art a God of pardons, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness. God is characterised not only as a pardoning God, but as a God of pardons. He is possessed, as it were, of such an inexhaustible store of pardons that the supply is sufficient to meet the most numerous necessities imaginable. If pardon be at all, there is no fear of stint in the supply, stint such as might leave some of us, against our will, out in the dark, out in the cold, out in the hurricane of storm and tempest. Whatever pardon may be in its essence and significance, there is assuredly enough of it and to spare, for all of us without distinction or exception, seeing God is a God of pardons.
The inner sanctuary of the humble home is the fireside. A lad in his teens, a member of a large family in Sheffield, left his home, and by persistent waywardness caused his parents considerable anxiety and pain. One night a young sister found him loitering in the locality. Her best effort could only bring him a little nearer the old home. A mothers glad welcome induced him to come in. Taking off his coat he shamefacedly proceeded to a chair near the door when his father called out Nay lad, dont sit theer; thas coom back; cum reight up te t fier.
My God, my God, have mercy on my sin,
For it is great; and if I should begin
To tell it all,
The day would be too small
To tell it in.
My God, Thou wilt have mercy on my sin
For Thy Loves sake: yea, if I should begin
To tell This all,
The day would be too small
To tell it in.1 [Note: Christina G. Rossetti.]
Abundant Pardon
Literature
Caird (J.), University Sermons, 27.
Church (R. W.), Village Sermons, i. 16.
Cox (S.), The Genesis of Evil, 61, 77.
Kingsley (C.), National Sermons, 221.
MCheyne (R. M.), Basket of Fragments, 72.
Morison (J.), Sheaves of Ministry, 102.
Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xx. No. 1195; xxxvi. No. 2181; xlviii. No. 2797.
Vaughan (J.), Sermons (Brighton Pulpit), xi. 930.
Walker (J.), Memoir and Sermons, 267.
Anglican Pulpit Library, ii. 160.
Christian World Pulpit, xvii. 158 (Short); xx. 341 (Moody); xxxvii. 53 (Morison).
Contemporary Pulpit, 1st Ser., vi. 313 (Glover).
Keswick Week, 1899, 16.
Preachers Magazine, i. 316.
Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible
the wicked: Isa 1:16-18, 2Ch 7:14, Pro 28:13, Jer 3:3, Jer 8:4-6, Eze 3:18, Eze 3:19, Eze 18:21-23, Eze 18:27-32, Eze 33:11, Eze 33:14-16, Hos 14:1, Hos 14:2, Jon 3:10, Mat 9:13, Luk 15:10, Luk 15:24, Act 3:19, Act 26:20, 1Co 6:9-11, Jam 4:8-10
unrighteous man: Heb. man of iniquity
his thoughts: Gen 6:5, Psa 66:18, Jer 4:14, Zec 8:17, Mat 15:18, Mat 15:19, Mat 23:25, Mat 23:26, Mar 7:21, Mar 7:23, Luk 11:39, Luk 11:40, Act 8:21, Act 8:22, Jam 1:15
for: Isa 43:25, Isa 44:22, Exo 34:6, Exo 34:7, Num 14:18, Num 14:19, Psa 51:1, Psa 130:7, Jer 3:12, Jer 3:13, Luk 7:47, Rom 5:16-21, Eph 1:6-8, 1Ti 1:15, 1Ti 1:16
abundantly: Heb. multiply to
Reciprocal: Exo 33:7 – sought Deu 4:29 – But if Deu 30:2 – return unto 1Sa 7:3 – return 2Sa 24:14 – for his 1Ki 8:48 – And so return 2Ki 17:13 – Turn ye 1Ch 16:10 – let the heart 1Ch 21:13 – great 1Ch 28:9 – if thou seek 2Ch 12:14 – to seek 2Ch 14:4 – seek 2Ch 15:2 – if ye seek him 2Ch 30:6 – turn again 2Ch 30:9 – will not Ezr 10:2 – yet now there is hope Neh 9:17 – gracious Neh 13:22 – greatness Job 8:5 – thou wouldest Job 22:23 – return Job 23:3 – where Job 36:10 – commandeth Psa 5:7 – in the Psa 7:12 – If Psa 9:10 – hast Psa 25:6 – thy tender mercies Psa 27:8 – Seek Psa 36:5 – mercy Psa 50:16 – wicked Psa 68:18 – rebellious Psa 69:32 – your heart Psa 86:5 – ready Psa 103:8 – merciful Psa 105:3 – let the heart Psa 119:101 – refrained Psa 119:113 – hate Psa 119:156 – are thy Psa 130:4 – But there Pro 1:23 – Turn Pro 10:5 – gathereth Pro 12:5 – thoughts Pro 24:9 – thought Son 3:4 – but Isa 1:19 – General Isa 7:3 – Shearjashub Isa 10:21 – return Isa 19:22 – they shall Isa 21:12 – if Isa 31:6 – Turn Isa 45:19 – Seek Isa 53:6 – his own Isa 56:1 – Keep Isa 63:7 – according to his Isa 65:2 – after Jer 7:3 – Amend Jer 18:11 – return Jer 24:7 – for they Jer 25:5 – Turn Jer 26:13 – amend Jer 29:13 – ye shall Jer 31:20 – I will Jer 33:3 – Call Jer 33:6 – and will Jer 36:3 – they may Lam 3:40 – turn Eze 14:6 – Repent Eze 18:31 – Cast Eze 36:37 – I will yet Dan 4:27 – break Dan 9:9 – To the Lord Hos 6:1 – and let Hos 12:6 – turn Joe 2:12 – turn Amo 5:4 – Seek Jon 3:8 – let Mic 7:18 – that Zep 2:3 – Seek ye Zec 1:3 – Turn Zec 7:7 – Should ye not hear the words Mal 3:7 – Return unto me Mat 5:25 – whiles Mat 6:5 – when Mat 7:7 – and it Mat 7:13 – at Mat 12:31 – All Mat 18:22 – but Mat 21:29 – he repented Mat 22:9 – General Mat 25:9 – but Mar 2:8 – Why Mar 2:17 – I came Luk 3:13 – Exact Luk 5:32 – General Luk 11:9 – seek Joh 6:37 – I will Act 9:11 – for Act 15:19 – turned Rom 5:15 – hath Rom 6:13 – unrighteousness 2Co 5:20 – as 2Co 7:1 – filthiness 2Co 10:5 – every thought Eph 1:7 – the forgiveness Eph 3:20 – exceeding Col 2:13 – having 2Th 1:11 – our God 1Ti 1:14 – exceeding Tit 2:12 – denying Heb 4:16 – obtain Heb 6:1 – repentance Heb 6:17 – more Jam 1:5 – let Jam 5:11 – the Lord is 1Pe 1:2 – be 1Jo 3:22 – whatsoever
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
55:7 Let the wicked {k} forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return to the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
(k) By this he shows that repentance must be joined with faith, and how we cannot call on God correctly, unless the fruits of our faith appear.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
The way was open for anyone to return to the Lord who may have wandered away from Him or rebelled against Him. The promise of a compassionate reception and abundant pardon applied, even to the wicked in act and the unrighteous in thought-in other words: to any sinner (cf. Mat 5:21-22; Mat 5:27-28).
Repentance is not something a person must do before God will accept him or her. It is simply a description of what seeking the Lord looks like. In other words, cleaning up one’s life is not a precondition for acceptance by God. The person who genuinely seeks the Lord and calls on His name has come to grips with his or her sin and is willing to turn it over to the Lord. After all, an unsaved person cannot forsake sin-or even desire to do so-without the Lord’s help.
God can pardon sinners because of the Servant’s work in paying the debt of their sins in their place. Clearly, a way back from Babylonian exile is not what Isaiah was describing here-but a way back to God.