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 offers of free grace are to all indiscriminately
It is always right and obligatory to point men to Christ.
Eternal life by the Son of God is to be pressed upon their acceptance. No
man has any commission to preach the gospel, except one who offers mercy "to
every creature." "Whoever will" is scriptural language. This method of
proclaiming salvation suits all classes of men. The strong believer and the
timid penitent alike draw life and hope from Christ freely offered. "Weak
souls are to be comforted with Christ—not with their own faith." Even a
young believer may look to Christ until his heart burns within him, and he
shouts for joy. But let any man look steadfastly at his own weakness,
vileness, guilt, and misery, and not get a glimpse of 'Christ crucified'—and
hope will die within him.
God never mocks any of his creatures. And while it is
true that Jesus Christ died with the intention of saving his people, and
none others, as he himself says, "I lay down my life for the sheep;" yet it
is no less true that there is an infinite storehouse of merit in Jesus
Christ. It is also certain that by God's authority, a full and free
salvation is indiscriminately offered to sinners. The final ruin of
incorrigible transgressors will be brought about by their unbelief, not by
the scantiness of the provisions of the gospel; by their enmity, not by any
lack of merit in Christ; by their hardness of heart, not by any lack of
sincerity in the offers of salvation; by their willful rejection of
blood-bought mercy, not by the insufficiency of the work and sufferings of
Jesus Christ.
It is no part of sound doctrine that the merit of our
Savior will be exhausted in the salvation of those whom the Father gave to
the Son, in the covenant of redemption. No branch of the church of Christ
holds that Christ's humiliation and sufferings would have been less if the
number of his elect had been less; nor that his humiliation and sufferings
would have been greater if his chosen ones had been more numerous. The merit
of Christ is in its very nature boundless. It possesses infinite,
inexhaustible worth.
The offer of life is to be made indiscriminately because
God so commands, because finite men can make it in no other way, and because
the provisions of the gospel are as well suited to the needs of one man as
to those of another. The call to men to believe the gospel should be earnest
and urgent, because God so makes it, because the matter is of infinite
consequence, because men are very sottish in their sins, and so greatly need
to be aroused from their guilty slumbers, and because their damnation
slumbers not. The offer of salvation is sincere, for God says so. It
is consistent, because God never denies himself. It is kind, because it is
sent in love, and cost more than we shall ever be able to repay.
This has been and is the doctrine of all pure churches.
The words of the Synod of Dort are express: "The death of the Son of God is
the only and most perfect sacrifice and satisfaction for sins, of infinite
price and value, abundantly sufficient to expiate the sins of the whole
world." Again: "The promise of the gospel is, that whoever believes in
Christ crucified, shall not perish, but have everlasting life. Which promise
ought to be announced and proposed, promiscuously and indiscriminately, to
all nations and men, to whom God in his good pleasure has sent the gospel,
with the command to repent and believe." The London Baptist Confession says:
"The preaching of the gospel to the conversion of sinners, is absolutely
free; no way requiring, as absolutely necessary, any qualifications,
preparations, or terrors of the law, or preceding ministry of the law—but
only and alone the naked soul, a sinner and ungodly—to receive Christ
crucified, dead and buried, and risen again; who is made a Prince and a
Savior for such sinners as through the gospel shall be brought to believe on
him."
Calvin says: "We know the promises to be effectual to us
only when we receive them by faith. On the contrary, the annihilation of
faith is the abolition of the promises. If this is their nature, we may
perceive that there is no discordance between these two things: God's having
appointed from eternity on whom he will bestow his favor and exercise his
wrath—and his proclaiming salvation to all. Indeed, I maintain that there is
the most perfect harmony between them." In the Synod of Dort we have an
example of the very staunchest Calvinists who have met in modern times; in
Calvin we have the very ablest expounder of the doctrines of grace since the
days of Paul, yet they would have salvation offered to all.
Few men have written on the death of Christ with more
force than John Owen. His matured sentiments on this subject have been
precious to the people of God for two full centuries. He says that "it was
the intention and purpose of God that his Son should offer a sacrifice of
infinite worth, value, and dignity—sufficient in itself for the redeeming of
all and every man, if it had pleased the Lord to employ it to that purpose;
yes, and of other worlds also, if the Lord should freely make them, and
would redeem them. Sufficient, we say then, was the sacrifice of Christ for
the redemption of the whole world, and for the expiation of all the sins of
all and every man in the world. This sufficiency of his sacrifice has a
two-fold rise. First; the dignity of the person wh did offer and was
offered. Secondly, the greatness of the pain he endured, by which he was
able to bear, and did undergo the whole curse of the law of God due to sin.
This manifests the innate, real, true worth of the blood-shedding of Jesus
Christ." If any man has a more blessed gospel than this to preach, he has
not yet told the world what it is.
Flavel says: "It is confessed, there is sufficiency of
virtue in the sacrifice of Christ to redeem the whole world." Manton says:
"For these six thousand years, God has been multiplying pardons, and yet
free grace is not exhausted. Christ undertook to satisfy, and he has money
enough to pay. It were folly to think that an emperor's revenue will not pay
a beggar's debt. God's mercy is an ocean, ever flowing, yet ever full."
Thomas Boston says, that "there was virtue and efficacy enough in Christ's
oblation to satisfy offended justice for the sins of the whole world, yes,
and of millions of worlds more; for his blood has infinite value, because of
the excellency and dignity of his person." John Brown of Haddington: "Such
is the infinite dignity of Christ's person, that his fulfillment of the
broken law is sufficient to balance all the debt of all the elect, nay, of
millions of guilty worlds." In proof, he refers to Col. 2:9; Isaiah 7:14,
and 9:6; Jer. 23:6; Zech. 13:7; Titus 2:13, 14, and Acts 20:28. Again he
says, that "In respect of its intrinsic worth as the obedience and
sufferings of a divine person, Christ's satisfaction is sufficient for the
ransom of all mankind, and being fulfilled in human nature, is equally
suited to all their necessities." No surer, broader foundation for a
sincere, consistent, general offer of mercy and -grace could be desired,
than is here admitted to exist in the finished work of the Mediator.
Witherspoon lays down three propositions on this subject,
which can hardly be questioned.
1. The obedience and death of Christ are of value
sufficient to expiate the guilt of all the sins of every individual that
ever lived, or ever shall live on earth. This cannot be denied—since the
subjects to be redeemed are finite, the price paid for their redemption
infinite.
2. Notwithstanding this, every individual of the human
race is not in fact partaker of this purchase, but many die in their sins,
and perish forever.
3. There is in the death of Christ a sufficient
foundation laid for the preaching of the gospel indefinitely to all without
exception. It is the command of God that this should be done. Mark 16:15:
'And he said unto them—Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every
creature.' The effect of this is, that the misery of the unbelieving and
impenitent shall be entirely at their own door; and they shall not only die
in their own sins, but shall suffer to eternity for the most heinous of all
sins—despising the remedy and refusing to hear the Son of God."
It may not be generally known how much the urgent and
indiscriminate offer of salvation by grace has been opposed. The great
Secession from the Church of Scotland, under Erskine and others, was in part
because of the wrong done to this blessed truth by the loose men who were
the dominant party of that day. At least the Moderates then greatly impugned
the doctrine of free offers of life, to sinners. It may well be doubted
whether a scene partaking more of the moral sublime has occurred in the last
hundred and fifty years, than when Ebenezer Erskine arose in the Synod of
Fife and said: "Moderator, our Lord Jesus says of himself, 'My Father gives
you the true bread from heaven.' This he uttered to a promiscuous multitude;
and let me see the man who dare say he said wrong." The heavenly sweetness
and solemnity of the speaker for the time hushed every controvertist.
Bellamy says: "Christ's merits are sufficient for all the
world, and the door of mercy is opened wide enough for all the world; and
God the supreme Governor has proclaimed himself reconcilable to all the
world, if they will believe and repent." Let all sinners know that if they
perish, it will not be because Christ has not died, nor because his merits
are not sufficient to meet all the demands of law and justice against them,
if they will but obey the gospel call. Matthew Henry says: "The eleven
apostles must send others to those places, where they could not go
themselves, and, in short, make it the business of their lives to send the
glad tidings of the gospel up and down the world, with all possible fidelity
and care, not as an amusement or entertainment, but as a solemn message from
God to men, and an appointed means of making men happy. 'Tell as many as you
can, and bid them tell others, it is a message of universal concern, and
therefore ought to have a universal welcome, because it gives a universal
welcome.'"
Doddridge: "The commission Christ gave his apostles,
though it began at Jerusalem, did not end there; nor was it confined within
the narrow limits of Judea; but they were appointed to go into all the
world, and preach the gospel to every creature." Scott says that the
apostles and their co-laborers "did testify to their fellow sinners
everywhere, that 'the Father had sent the Son to be the Savior of the
world,' and to confer pardon, grace, and eternal life, on all men, in every
place, who sought them from the Father, through the propitiation of the Son,
by living faith in his name." Hodge says: "The doctrine of the atonement
produces in us its proper effects, when it leads us to see that God is just;
that he is infinitely gracious; that we are deprived of all ground of
boasting; that the way of salvation, which is open for us, is open for all
men; and that the motives to all duty, instead of being weakened—are
enforced and multiplied."
Haldane says that Christ's "sacrifice could not have been
sufficient for any, if it had not been sufficient for all. An atonement of
infinite value was necessary for every individual that shall be saved, and
more could not be necessary for all the world. The intrinsic sufficiency of
Christ's sacrifice was doubtless in view in the divine appointment
concerning it. God made provision of such a sacrifice as was not only
sufficient effectually to take away the sins of all the elect; but also
sufficient to be laid before all mankind, in the dispensation of the gospel.
In the gospel it was to be declared to all mankind that, in their nature,
the Son of God had made an atonement of infinite value, and brought in
everlasting righteousness, which shall be upon all who believe. This
atonement, then, being all-sufficient in itself, is proclaimed to all who
hear the gospel. All are invited to rely upon it for pardon and acceptance,
as freely and fully as if they knew that God designed it for them from all
eternity, and all who thus rely upon it shall experience the blessing of its
efficacy and infinite value."
Let not perishing men, therefore, stand at a distance and
say—'There is no way of escape, no door of mercy open, no salvation offered
to us, and we must die in our sins!' The calls of the gospel are as sincere
on the part of God to men, who refuse salvation, as to those who accept it.
That is, God is infinitely sincere in all he says and does.