Chapter 13: True Submission Answer. The offer of mercy may be perverted, as every other good thing may be, and then it may give rise to a selfish religion. And God knew it would be so, when he revealed the gospel. But observe: Nothing is calculated to subdue the rebellious heart of man, but this very exhibition of the benevolence of God, in the offer of mercy.
There was a father who had a stubborn and rebellious son, and he tried long to subdue him by chastisement. He loved his son, and lodged to have him virtuous and obedient. But the child seemed to harden his heart against his repeated efforts. At length the poor father was quite discouraged, and burst out into a flood of convulsive weeping "My son! my son! what shall I do? Can I save you? I have done all that I could to save you; O what can I do more? "The son had looked at the rod with a brow of brass, but when he saw the tears rolling down his father's furrowed cheeks, and heard the convulsive sobs of anguish from his aged bosom, he too burst into tears, and cried out, "Whip me father! do whip me, as much as you please, but don't cry!" Now the father had found out the way to subdue that stubborn heart.
Instead of holding over him nothing but the iron hand of law, he let out his soul before him; and what was the effect? To crash him into hypocritical submission? No, the rod did that.
The gushing tears of his father's love broke him down at once to true submission to his father's will.
So it is with sinners. The sinner braves the wrath of Almighty God, and hardens himself to receive the heaviest bolt of Jehovah's thunder; but when he sees the love of his Heavenly
Father's heart, if there is anything that will make him abhor and execrate himself, that will do it, when he sees God manifested in the flesh, stooping to take human nature, hanging on the cross, and pouring out his soul in tears, and bloody sweat, and death. Is this calculated to make hypocrites?
No, the sinner's heart melt, and he cries out, "O, do any thing else, and I can bear it; but the love of the blessed Jesus overwhelms me." This is the very nature of the mind, to be thus influenced. Instead, therefore, of being afraid of exhibiting the love of God to sinners, it is the only way to make them truly submissive and truly benevolent. The law may make hypocrites; but nothing but the gospel can draw out the soul so true love to God.