Now Christ will pass over all their weaknesses, and make honourable mention of all the services they have performed, of all the mercies they have improved, and of all the great things that, for His name and glory, they have suffered.

CHAPTER V.

In the great day of accounts, will the sins of saints be brought into the judgment of discussion and discovery, or no? The negative proved by divers argu

ments.

BUT here an apt question may be moved: Whether, at this great day, the sins of the saints shall be brought into the judgment of discussion and discovery, or no? whether the Lord will in this day publicly manifest, proclaim, and make mention of the sins of His people, or no?

I humbly judge, according to my present light, that He will not; and my reasons for it are these:

I. The first is drawn from Christ's judicial proceedings in the last day, set down largely and clearly in the 25th chapter of Matthew, where He enumerateth only the good works they had done, but takes no notice of the spots and blots, of the stains and blemishes, of the infirmities and enormities, of the weaknesses and wickednesses of His people.

II. My second reason is taken from Christ's vehement protestations that they shall not come

H

into judgment: John v. 24, “ Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life." Those words, "shall not come into condemnation," are not rightly translated; the original is, "eis crisin," "shall not come into judgment," not "into damnation," as you read it in all your English books. I will not say what should put men upon this exposition, rather than a true translation of the original word. Further, it is very observable, that no evangelist useth this double asseveration but St. John; and he never useth it, but in matters of greatest weight and importance, and to shew the earnestness of his spirit, and to stir us up to better attention, and to put the thing asserted out of all question, and beyond all contradiction; as when we would put a thing for ever out of all question, we do it by a double asseveration, Verily, verily, it is so.

III. Because His not bringing their sins into judgment, doth most and best agree with many precious and glorious expressions that we find scattered, as so many shining, sparkling pearls, up and down in Scripture; as,

1. With those of God's blotting out the sins of His people: Isa. xliii. 25, "I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions, for Mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins." "I have blotted

out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins," Isa. xliv. 22.

Who is this that blotteth out transgressions? He that hath the keys of heaven and hell at His girdle: that opens, and no man shuts; that shuts, and no man opens; He that hath the power of life and death, of condemning and absolving, of killing and making alive; He it is that blotteth out transgressions. If an under-officer should blot out an indictment, that perhaps might do a man no good; a man might for all that be at last cast by the judge; but when the judge or king shall blot out the indictment with their own hand, then the indictment can

not return.

happiness.

Now this is every believer's case and

2. To those glorious expressions of God's not remembering their sins any more: Isa. xliii. 25, "And I will not remember thy sins." "And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for they shall all know Me, from the least to the greatest, for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." So the apostle, Heb. viii. 12: "For I will be merciful unto their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." And again the same apostle saith, “This is the covenant that I will make with them, after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and in their hearts will I write them,

and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more."

The meaning is, their iniquities shall be quite forgotten: "I will never mention them more, I will never take notice of them more, they shall never hear more of them from Me." Though God hath an iron memory to remember the sins of the wicked, yet He hath no memory to remember the sins of the righteous.

3. His not bringing their sins into judgment, doth most and best agree with those blessed expressions of His casting their sins into the depth of the sea, and of His casting them behind His back: "He will turn again, He will have compassion upon us; He will subdue our iniquities: and Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea," Micah vii. 19. Where sin is once pardoned, the remission stands never to be repealed. Pardoned sin shall never come in account against the pardoned man before God any more, for so much doth this borrowed speech import: If a thing were cast upon the sea, it might be discerned, and taken up again: but when it is cast into the depths, the bottom of the sea, it can never be buoyed up again.

By the metaphor in the text, the Lord would have us to know, that sins pardoned shall rise no more, they shall never be seen more, they shall never come on to the account more; He will so drown their sins, that they shall never come up before Him the second time.