MacDonald: salvation from consequences?

Tuesday, September 18, 2012
    Commemoration of George MacDonald, Spiritual Writer, 1905
Meditation:
    [Angel:] “She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”
    —Matthew 1:21 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The notion that the salvation of Jesus is a salvation from the consequences of our sins, is a false, mean, low notion. The salvation of Christ is salvation from the smallest tendency or leaning to sin. It is a deliverance into the pure air of God’s ways of thinking and feeling. It is a salvation that makes the heart pure, with the will and choice of the heart to be pure. To such a heart, sin is disgusting. It sees a thing as it is,—that is, as God sees it, for God sees everything as it is. The soul thus saved would rather sink into the flames of hell than steal into heaven and skulk there under the shadow of an imputed righteousness. No soul is saved that would not prefer hell to sin. Jesus did not die to save us from punishment; he was called Jesus because he should save his people from their sins.
    ... George MacDonald (1824-1905), “Justice”, in Unspoken Sermons, Third Series, London: Longmans, Green, 1889, p. 132-133 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, purge away my tendency to sin. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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