But the truth of God’s essential holiness needed a more clear and impressive discovery and illustration; and God has given it. Where was there ever such a demonstration of God’s infinite hatred of sin, and his fixed and solemn determination to punish it, as is seen in the cross of Christ? Put thy shoes from off thy feet, draw near and contemplate this “great sight.” Who was the sufferer? God’s only begotten and well-beloved Son! His own Son! In addition to the infinitely tender love of the Father, there was the clear knowledge of the truth, that He who was enduring the severest inflictions of his wrath was innocent, guiltless, righteous — that he, himself, had never broken his law, had never opposed his authority, had never run counter to his will; but had always done those things which pleased him. At whose hands did he suffer? From devils, from men? They were but the agents; the moving Cause was God himself. “It pleased the Lord to bruise him: he hath put him to grief.” His own Father unsheathed the sword: he inflicted the blow: he kindled the fierce flame: he prepared the bitter cup. “Awake, O sword, against my Shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts: smite the Shepherd.” “The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?” “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” And what were the nature and degree of his sufferings? Imagine, if we can, what must have been the outpouring of God’s wrath upon the whole church for all the sins of that church, through eternity! Can you compute the amount of her transgressions? Can you conceive of the degree of her punishment? Can you measure the duration of her woe? Impossible! Then, who can tell what Jesus endured, when standing in the place and as the Surety of his Church, in the solemn hour of atonement, and in the day of God’s fierce anger? Never had God so manifested before, and never will he so manifest again, his essential holiness, — his spotless purity, — the inconceivable heinousness of sin, — His utter hatred of it, — and His solemn purpose to punish it with the severest inflictions of His wrath. Never did this glorious perfection of His being blaze out in such overwhelming glory, as on that dark day, and in the cross of the incarnate God. Had He emptied the vial of His wrath full upon the world, sweeping it before the fury of His anger, and consigning it to condign and eternal punishment, it would not have presented to the universe so vivid, so impressive, and so awful a demonstration of the nature and glory of His holiness, of His infinite abhorrence of sin, and the necessity wherefore He should punish it, as He has presented in the humiliation, sufferings, and death of his beloved Son. What new and ineffably transcendent views of infinite purity must have sprung up in the pure minds even of the spirits in glory, as bending from their thrones they fixed their astonished gaze upon the cross of the suffering Son of God!
Octavius Winslow