The Grace of Christ, or,
Sinners Saved by Unmerited Kindness
William S. Plumer, 1853
"We believe it is through the grace of our
Lord Jesus that we are saved." Acts 15:11
The PROPERTIES of grace. It is free,
sufficient, unselfish, rich in blessings.
In many things the grace of God differs from all other
manifestations of favor. We should not be surprised at this when we reflect
that as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are his ways higher than
our ways, and his thoughts than our thoughts. There are none like Jehovah in
love, or in majesty, in glory or in condescension. Beyond everything else,
grace is FREE. It is beyond the power of
man to earn it, to deserve it, to purchase it. No price is to be paid for
it. To offer anything as an equivalent for it is to insult God. "Without
money and without price" is the sole method of its bestowment. This grace is
absolutely, everlastingly, immutably free. If you ever secure it, it will
not be by paying for it thousands of rivers of oil, the cattle on a thousand
hills, or the wealth of the world.
This grace is, moreover,
ALL-SUFFICIENT. It alone does all. He, who has it, is rich
beyond the power of need, is strong beyond the possibility of being
finally vanquished, is justified so that he can never come into
condemnation. It meets every demand of justice, every temptation, every
emergency. "My grace is sufficient for you," are words as sweet as ever
reached the ears of mortals.
Another property of divine grace is that it is
UNSELFISH. It is pure grace. The
happiness of the King of kings is not augmented by having kings and priests
to bow before him. God is, and was, and shall be blessed for evermore. God's
almightiness excludes all need, by excluding all weakness. If God could fail
in anything, he might cease to be blessed and so cease to be God. When there
was as yet no created spirit, and the eternal God existed in solitary
grandeur in the universe, that Infinite and Eternal Mind was as happy as it
is now, or ever shall be. To the divine blessedness there is no limit, there
comes no change. Like his wisdom, power, holiness and truth, his happiness
cannot vary. Neither creation nor redemption was undertaken to heighten the
bliss of the Godhead.
The Bible teaches that if men were even spotlessly holy,
they would still be unprofitable servants. "If you sin, how does that affect
him? If your sins are many, what does that do to him? If you are righteous,
what do you give to him, or what does he receive from your hand? Your
wickedness affects only a man like yourself, and your righteousness only the
sons of men. Can a man be of benefit to God? Can even a wise man benefit
him? What pleasure would it give the Almighty if you were righteous? What
would he gain if your ways were blameless?" Job 35:6-8 and 22:2-3. God does
indeed order all things for his own honor and glory; but that is not for the
increase of his infinite blessedness. Pure grace and unbought love have done
all for sinners. There is no mixture of God's grace and man's goodness in
salvation. God owed nothing, could owe nothing to apostate man. It is a
shameful and wicked derogation from the grace of the Gospel to assert that
God intended thereby to make amends to our race for the defects of the
covenant of works. That covenant was wise, holy, just and good. Under it the
angels enjoy all their bliss. As long as man kept it, he was unspeakably
happy. And when he fell under the curse of that covenant, he did it not by
any inevitable necessity of nature, but by his own voluntary choice of that
which had been forbidden.
Nowhere in the Bible is it hinted that God originated the
covenant of grace as something due to us. On the contrary, it traces all to
divine bountifulness and mercifulness. It speaks on this wise: "But because
of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with
Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--it is by grace you have
been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the
heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might
show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us
in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and
this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no
one can boast. Ephesians 2:4-9. Many other portions of Scripture teach the
same truth, but this one is so full and explicit that nothing but perversity
and blindness can misconstrue its precious doctrine.
The peculiar sweetness and excellence of this view of the
subject is, first, that it renders illustrious beyond a parallel, the mercy
of God in Christ, and thus lays a sure foundation for the temple of praise
which is now rising to the sovereign love of God. Secondly, this view brings
strong consolation to the godly, because if God had gracious regards towards
them when they had no holiness nor good desires, they may assuredly hope
that having freely given them new hearts, and having also freely justified
them—he will not abandon them to ruin, nor hand them over to condemnation.
Nor is this grace in its bestowments limited to a few small items. It would
have been unmerited kindness for eternal mercy to have expressed any pity
for man. It would have been more than man deserved for God to have given him
a respite of a thousand years from the fiery doom, which was before him. It
is mere mercy that keeps a sinner out of hell even for an hour! But when God
undertook to be gracious, he confined himself to no little work, but devised
a plan incomprehensibly great and glorious, running through all coming time,
and the eternity beyond that, and embracing in its effects in some way,
myriads on myriads of happy creatures, who study it, admire it, or taste its
abundant provisions. So that on this side of heaven there is no higher
exercise of virtue than simply to believe and cordially to rely upon the
statements of God's word respecting this greatest of all devices.
The first result attained by the works of grace in our
world, is the securing of an unparalleled revenue of renown to the divine
government. Glory to God in the highest is an effect peculiar to the work of
redemption. To men the results are as happy, as to God they are honorable.
The fruits of God's grace are so many, and so rich, and so necessary, that
we may safely say, without them existence is not desirable; but with them
life is a great blessing and blessing, though it should be begun by ten
thousand years of such affliction as the saints on earth are subject to.
God's plan of mercy in Christ secures us against all conceivable ills,
except such as shall themselves be made the means of ultimate and eternal
gain to us. It also secures the possession of all conceivable good things
for this world and the next, and at the best possible time. The tenor of
Scripture on these points is unmistakable: "All things are yours; whether
Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things
present, or things to come; all are yours; and you are Christ's; and Christ
is God's." 1 Cor. 3:21-23.
Even inspired men seem at a loss for words to convey an
adequate conception of any of God's saving mercies. In his gospel, John
says, "God so loved the world." And in his first epistle he says,
"Behold! How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we
should be called children of God!" Paul breaks out, "Thanks be to God for
His indescribable gift!"
With our Lord and his apostles, crowns and kingdoms are
favorite emblems of the riches of our inheritance in Christ. Nor does God
ever revoke any promise made to man in Christ Jesus. "The Lord is not man
that he should repent." He never begins to build and finds himself unable to
finish. Nor has he affixed to the gospel offer any meritorious condition to
be performed by us. Jesus Christ fulfilled the entire conditions of the
covenant of grace—so far as satisfying the law and bringing in righteousness
are concerned. The fourth property of this grace, then, is that it is
exceedingly fruitful in the most precious and most permanent blessings!