Sir Godfrey Gregg D.Div
“That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so, might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 5:21
Asian bondage. But they sighed and groaned by reason of the bondage, and their cry came up unto God. He had respect unto his covenant, and looked upon them and delivered them (Exodus 2:23-25). So God has determined on behalf of his people that sin shall not be their eternal ruin; that it shall not plunge them into crime after crime, until it casts them at last into the Gulf of endless woe, but that grace “shall reign through righteousness unto eternal life.” But it must reign here as well as hereafter, for by its reign here its eternal triumph is secured. It must then subdue our proud hearts, and never cease to sway its peaceful scepter over them until it has secured in them absolute and unconditional victory. Now, this is what every sincere child of God most earnestly longs to feel and realize. He longs to embrace Jesus and be embraced by him in the arms of love and affection. As the hymn says,
“But now subdued by sovereign grace, My spirit longs for thy embrace.”
He hates sin, though it daily, hourly, momently works in him, and is ever seeking to regain its former mastery; he abhors that cruel tyrant who set him to do his vilest drudgery, deceived and deluded him by a thousand lying promises, dragged him again and again into captivity, and but for sovereign grace would have sealed his eternal destruction. Subdued by the scepter of mercy, he longs for the dominion of grace over every faculty of his soul and every member of his body. “O,” he says, “let grace reign and rule in my breast; let it not suffer any sin to have dominion over me; let it tame every unruly desire, and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ!” Thus, he who truly fears God looks to grace, and to grace only, not merely to save, but to sanctify; not only to pardon sin but to subdue it; not only to secure him an inheritance among the saints in light but to make him meet for it.
THE MYSTICAL COURT 