with our sins? Like a pack
of hounds they are after me; wherever I flee they are close upon me.
"The wages of sin is death," I am told, but I have found the way of
escape. Here flows a stream which runs red with the blood of Jesus
Christ, and I plunge in and am free.

"There is a fountain filled with blood,
Drawn from Immanuel's veins;
And sinners plunged beneath that flood
Lose all their guilty stains."

THE GRACE OF GOD

TEXT: "_I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine
own sake, and will not remember thy sins._"--Isaiah 43:25.

In looking over an old volume of Sermons preached by H. Grattan
Guiness, forty-five years ago, I came across the message which he
delivered with this text as a basis. So deep was the impression made
upon me by my first reading of the sermon that I have taken Mr.
Guiness' outline and ask your careful attention to its development.

If one should enter a jewelry store and ask to see a diamond, or any
other precious stone, the jeweler would first spread upon his show case
a black cloth and then place the diamonds upon it, not only for
protection but also in order that the black background might bring out
distinctly the brilliancy and worth of the gems. So God gives this
best of all his promises with the dark picture of sin clearly and
thoughtfully portrayed. In verses twenty-second to the twenty-fourth
we read, "But thou hast not called upon me, O Jacob; but thou hast been
weary of me, O Israel. Thou hast not brought me the small cattle of
thy burnt offerings; neither hast thou honored me with thy sacrifices.
I have not caused thee to serve with an offering, nor wearied thee with
incense. Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money, neither hast
thou filled me with the fat of thy sacrifices: but thou hast made me to
serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities."

In these verses God says that his people have not called upon him in
prayer, they have not presented their offerings, neither have they
presented unto him themselves. He also affirms that they have wearied
of him, and that they have also wearied him with their iniquities, and
then he exclaims, "I have not caused thee to serve with an offering,
nor wearied thee with incense," and with these clear statements he
gives us the gracious statement of the text, "I, even I, am he that
blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not
remember thy sins."

Mr