Oh, the marvels of sovereign grace!

Charles Spurgeon, et al. "Amazing Grace"

(You will find it helpful to LISTEN to the Audio, as you READ the text below.)

Isaiah 57:18, "I have seen his ways, but I will heal him."

"I have seen his ways!"

Man is as much under his Maker's eye, as the bees in a glass hive are under your eye when you stand and watch all their movements.

The eye of Jehovah never sleeps; it is never removed from a single creature that He has made. He sees man wherever he goes: in the darkness, as well as the light. He sees him through and through, so that He not only hears his words but, knows his thoughts. He does not merely behold his actions, but weighs his motives.

No stray thought of yours, no imagination, no trifle which you have quite forgotten, which indeed you never took any heed of--has escaped your heavenly Father's notice!

God has seen your ways at home, your ways abroad and your ways in the shop. He has seen the ways of your inner reasonings, the ways of your hopes, the ways of your desires, the ways of your evil lustings, the ways of your murmurings, and the ways of your pride. He has seen them all, and seen them perfectly and completely!

"The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives!" Jeremiah 17:9-10

"But I will heal him!"

Divine wisdom could not find anything but vices to describe the wickedness of the human heart. It is so foul a thing that He must compare it to the lewdness and filthiness of those who are given over to utter wickedness. And yet, after so describing the character, the Lord says, "I have seen his ways, but I will heal him." That is, "I have seen everything wicked in his ways, and I have perceived nothing good in them; but nevertheless, though I know all his conduct, and see the filthiness of it all--yet I will come to him, and I will heal him."

It so amazes me that God's electing love should cast its eye upon the very vilest of the vile, and then that He should say, "I have seen him. I know what he has done. I understand it all--and yet I mean to save him, and save him I will! I will bring my omnipotent love to bear on this foul, leprous, rotting, loathsome sinner--and I will make him clean, pure, and lovely!"

Oh, the marvels of sovereign grace! That the thrice-holy God would stoop to save not the religious, nor the respectable--but the vilest of the vile! Such were many of us, and yet He did not cast us off:

He drew us with cords of loving-kindness,
opened our blind eyes,
softened our stony hearts,
and washed us clean in the blood of the Lamb,
and made us trophies of His redeeming love!