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"But God......"
by Jonathan Edwards-
"Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the
kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually
immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes
nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor
drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the
kingdom of God. And that is what some of you WERE.
BUT you were washed, you were sanctified,
you were
justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and
by the Spirit of our God." (1 Col. 6:9-11)
For such WERE the some of you.
The case was just so with you as you have heard- you had such
a wicked heart, you lived such a wicked life, and it would have
been most just with God for ever to have cast you off.
BUT He has had mercy upon; he has made his glorious
grace appear in your everlasting salvation.
You had no love to God;
But yet He exercised unspeakable love to you.
You have scorned God, and set light by Him; but so great a
value has God's grace set on you and your happiness, that you
have been redeemed at the price of the blood of His own Son.
You chose to be with Satan in his service;
but yet God has made you a joint heir with Christ of His glory.
You were ungrateful for past mercies;
yet God not only continued those mercies,
but bestowed unspeakably greater mercies upon you.
You refused to hear when God called;
yet God has manifested the infiniteness of
that mercy in the exercises of it towards you.
You have rejected Christ, and set Him at nought;
and yet He has become your Savior.
You have neglected your own salvation;
but God has not neglected it.
You would have destroyed yourself but yet in God has been
your help. But God has magnified His free grace towards you,
and not to others.
Because He has chosen you, and it has pleased Him
to set His love upon you.
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