In the Divine government, love is the central element, and justice only incidental. ITS CHARACTERISTICS.1. )The love of GodA. said the preacher. But "God commendeth," etc.(A. The God of the Bible.2. His law, the order of creation, the arrangement of His providence are expressions of His love.4. Eternal: "loved." It way layeth thee in love; it meeteth thee in tenderness. Has God so loved the world as to give, etc.? It offers the supremest blessings on the easiest, cheapest terms. (1)Negative: "should not perish. Barnes, D. D.)Christ's mission a revelation of God's loveE. W. C. Jones, D. D.The ocean is always moving, but it is not self-moving. THE DOCTRINE. It takes its rise in the Gulf of Mexico and sweeps across through the heart of the mighty Atlantic to the Arctic Seas; and by its strong currents, more rapid than that of the Mississippi, it engulfs every other ocean stream that comes athwart its course, making it tributary to its own grand mission of washing the shores and ameliorating the climate of the sea-bound countries of Europe. each gave the same answer.III. IN THE GIFT. Thompson. There is nothing in the love or sacrifice of the Father and the Son to prevent the whole world being saved. Yet infidelity is the want of trust in God and Christ. Negatively: that man might not loose himself utterly from God, duty, happiness. It wants no money and no price from thee, no fitness of frames and feelings, no preparation of good works or penitence. Nay, that is not enough. (1)No other mercy can be so dear to God as Jesus is. The first cause of redemption — the love of God to man. God can love and does love. "Do your gods love you?" IN THE PLAN OF SALVATION. "(2)Positive: "have everlasting life."(R. Barnes, D. D.These words express the substance of the gospel. It tarrieth not for thee: it cometh to thee as thou art. Baxendale.A preacher had gone down into a coal mine during the noon-hour to tell the miners of the glad tidings of salvation. H. W. He was just as worthy of love and confidence before as after the atonement. (a)By His humanity He taught men by doctrine and example. This could only be done by allowing His Son to be treated as if He was a sinner, in order to treat the really guilty as if they were righteous, and so to identify the one with the other. )The Divine loveJ. H. Spurgeon.A story has been often told of the fondness of parents for their children; how in a famine in the East a father and mother were reduced to absolute starvation, and the only possibility of preserving the life of the family was to sell one of the children into slavery. W. There is a great deal of such which says, "Be ye warmed," etc. God's motives were perfectly unselfish.3. The world was guilty. Come with me again to Jerusalem. To believe in Christ — what is it? It is easy to see that the honour of the law might be fully sustained by God Himself if He should show before the whole universe His approbation of the law. Doubt is the great gulf fixed between you and God, but faith is the link which binds us to Him. Spurgeon. It is always a sore strain on mercy when solicited for the wilful. Man nor woman need fear disappointment there. The world was at enmity with God. THIS DELIVERANCE HAS BEEN WROUGHT OUT BY SELF-SACRIFICE ON THE PART OF GOD.IV. What a gospel — good news — is here! (4) Here, however, is the marvel of marvels — standing alone in the universe — that God loves a race that has defied and insulted Him.2. Why? Flavel. )Believe onlyC. His love is a mighty stream of warm, generous commiseration sweeping with mighty force towards that moral Arctic Sea sin has made of our world. Lewis, B. A.I. This life is "everlasting." This did not engender or excite His love, it only manifested it.2. Here, then, we have hit upon the radical difference between paganism and Christianity. J. Morris.If we could but hear the words for the first time, and without prepossessions either of Pharisaic error or logical orthodoxy, hear them with nothing but consciousness of sin and thirst for life, before the love of God had been hardened into doctrine, and the only begotten Son has become a quarrel for the schools. It was glorious and justified the means — the salvation of the world. There is nothing in the love or sacrifice of the Father and the Son to prevent the whole world being saved. Eternal: "loved." The world's misery and peril were caused by itself. To part is to perish; and so he clings — and how anxiously! LOVE IN ITS PUREST FORM. On one occasion a missionary was dictating to a native amanuensis the translation of the First Epistle, and when he reached the passage, "Now are we the sons of God," the poor child of heathenism burst into tears, and exclaimed, " It is too much, it is too much; let me put it, Now are we permitted to kiss His feet."(A. Barnes, D. D.)Christ's mission a revelation of God's loveE. Thomas, D. D.It is not like a banquet, accommodated to the tastes and wants of so many and no more. THE OBJECT CONTEMPLATED IN THE BESTOWAL OF THIS GIFT.1. J. Morris.If we could but hear the words for the first time, and without prepossessions either of Pharisaic error or logical orthodoxy, hear them with nothing but consciousness of sin and thirst for life, before the love of God had been hardened into doctrine, and the only begotten Son has become a quarrel for the schools. It has in view the salvation of every individual.2. 2. 14). This will show that the love of the king was seen all the more from the justice of his administration.(S. "No man taketh My life from Me."III. H. Spurgeon. II. Newton, D. D.)God's love and its giftJ. But "He took not hold on angels, but the seed of Abraham." It rolled in a grand irresistible current towards the shores of our world. (8)It was not for a single Christian as such, but for a world of sinners. Try God by His own rule. God so loved the world, that He gave His-only begotten Son. It is as a father pitieth his children.(S. The world: man in his corrupt and miserable state (John 5:19).2. H. Spurgeon. He pities the souls that sin has ruined.4. J. Parry)The love of GodH. (2) The Redeemer was "given," not to be a mere teacher or example, but to be the propitiation for sin.3. It is like the wood which Moses took and placed in the bitter waters of Mara. It is to assure us that while the love of God may be traced in every object in nature, and read on every page of Providence, as the colours of the rainbow may be found in every ray of silvery sun-light, yet the brightest and the fullest manifestation of it is in the mission of Jesus into the world to save sinners. It is like the wood which Moses took and placed in the bitter waters of Mara. LOVE IN ITS NOBLEST INTENTION.1. 'What!' THIS DELIVERANCE HAS BEEN WROUGHT OUT BY SELF-SACRIFICE ON THE PART OF GOD.IV. Doubt is the great gulf fixed between you and God, but faith is the link which binds us to Him. Love. If God loved this fallen world and not the world of fallen angels His love must be sovereign. Universal because particular. THE OBJECT CONTEMPLATED IN THE BESTOWAL OF THIS GIFT.1. Cynddylan Jones, D. D.)Immeasurable loveC. But in the Incarnation and Propitiation was it revealed, only then did it force itself upon the obtuse vision of the world. "Stop," said the king, "take the other from me." The thought of this awful perdition made Jesus weep over Jerusalem and say, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem: thou that killest the prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings, and ye would not."(Rev. Admire the pertinacity of this love. As sin is this it cannot be treated lightly. Not mere feeling, as in those who are carried away by strong emotion. (1) This is a doctrine distinctive of the Bible. "Of course not," replied the miner, "As I have said, you have nothing to do but to get into the cage." WE LIVE IN THE GLORIOUS DAY OF SALVATION! This was well brought out in a prison the other day, when the chaplain said to me, "I want to describe a scene that occurred here some time ago. He gave His Son to make the atonement due to law.2. Only believe that Jesus has the will and the power to save and your confidence will not be disappointed.1. Beecher. But "He took not hold on angels, but the seed of Abraham." On whom the gift was bestowed. W. Dale, D. D.I. This is illustrated in the miracles of Christ. J. Morris.If we could but hear the words for the first time, and without prepossessions either of Pharisaic error or logical orthodoxy, hear them with nothing but consciousness of sin and thirst for life, before the love of God had been hardened into doctrine, and the only begotten Son has become a quarrel for the schools. "He gave His only-begotten Son."(J. — When William Knibb had been preaching from this text in Jamaica, returning home he came up with an old black woman, and he said to her, "What do you think of the great love of God?" Wherever there is a man in the way to perish, there is the world God loved. He so loved, that is, so infinitely, so transcendently, so incomprehensibly (Hebrews 12:3). Central, and was as silent as death gleams through the dark when... 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