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That matchless death!
from Spurgeon's sermon, "Priest and Victim"
That same God that painted every flower,
that spread the skies,
the God that made us,
came here in human form,
and after living here a life of blessing and beneficence,
he died as a sacrifice for human guilt!
Never was there such news as that
the infinite,
the immortal,
the eternal,
the invisible,
the almighty,
the loving God did come,
and take upon himself the sin of men,
and at last suffered and died in the
room and stead of guilty sinners!
Oh, wonder of wonders!
O poor believing sinner, I want you to think of this!
Let your soul see Jesus on the cross-
bleeding,
writhing,
suffering,
tortured,
dying,
dead!
There was something GREAT done for you there!
Your great 'sin' has been buried there!
That great 'hell', which you ought to have endured,
has been extinguished there, so far as you are concerned!
That great 'heaven', which you could never else have entered,
has been opened there, since he died for you there!
Untold blessings are insured to you in
THAT MATCHLESS DEATH!
Oh! how this truth wins your affections!
Can you help loving the Christ who offered up himself for you?
And loving him, do you not desire to honor and glorify him?
Do you not feel that you hate the sin that made him die?
Do you not wish to be like him, and in everything to give him
delight by a life of holiness, and self-denial, and self-sacrifice?
I know you do; it must be so.
Because Jesus sacrificed himself for you,
you feel that you must love him with all your heart!
Does not this truth also arouse your admiration?
Say, brothers and sisters, if there is anything that can move you
like this glorious truth of which I have been speaking?
Does it not arouse your highest admiration when you remember
that the Lord Jesus Christ took your sin upon himself,
and suffered in your stead?
I know that there is no hand that can sweep the strings of my
heart with such power as can the hand that was pierced for me!
This theme enkindles my enthusiasm, and stirs my passions to a
flame, and makes me wish for the tongues of men and of angels
that I might be able to tell out this story of "love so amazing, so
divine."
I would ask no other heaven, if I might have my choice,
than having to meditate upon the passion of my Lord,
and to tell it out to others, and then to fall at his dear feet,
and worship him world without end, for he was slain,
and has redeemed me by his precious blood!
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