ttribute that they
are trying to exalt. A love that cares nothing for the moral character
of its object is not love, but hate; it is not kindness, but cruelty.
Take away the background because it is so black, and you lower the
brilliancy of whiteness of that which stands in front of it. There is
such a property in God as is fittingly described by that tremendous word
'wrath.' God cannot, being what He is, treat sin as if it were no sin;
and therefore we read, 'He sent His son to be the _propitiation_ for our
sins.' The black dam, which we build up between ourselves and the river
of the water of life, is to be swept away; and it is the death of Jesus
Christ which makes it possible for the highest gift of God's love to
pour over the ruined and partially removed barrier and to flood a man's
soul. Brethren, no God that is worthy the name can give Himself to a
sinful soul. No sinful soul that has not the habit, the guilt, the
penalty of its sins swept away, is capable of receiving the life, which
is the highest gift of the love. So our twin texts divide what I may
call the process of redemption between them; and whilst the one says,
'He sent His Son that we should have life through Him,' the other tells
us of how the sins which bar the entrance of that life into our hearts,
as our own consciences tell us they do, can be removed. There must first
be the propitiation for our sins, and then that mighty love reaches its
purpose and attains its end, and can give us the life of God to be the
life of our souls. So much for my first and principle question.

II. Now I have to ask, secondly, how comes it that Christ's mission says
anything about God's love?

That question is a very plain one, and I should like to press the answer
to it very emphatically. Take any other of the great names of the
world's history of poet, thinker, philosopher, moralist, practical
benefactor; is it possible to apply such a thought as this to
them--except with a hundred explanations and limitations--that they,
however radiant, however wise, however beneficent, however fruitful
their influence, make men sure that God loves them? The thing is
ridiculous, unless you are using language in a very fantastic and
artificial fashion.

Christ's mission reveals God's love, because Christ is the Son of God.
If it is true, as Jesus said, that 'He that hath seen Me hath seen the
Father,' then I can say, 'In Thy tenderness, in Thy patience, in Thy
attracting of the pu