This Is Why I Love Vintage Books...

More George Smeaton:

"THE fact of sin with its vast and far-reaching consequences, of which no finite mind can adequately take the dimensions, is seen from every point of our inquiry. The Humiliation of the incarnate Son was primarily planned in connection with a remedial scheme, and is therefore a provision in the Divine counsels by occasion of sin. They who object, on speculative grounds, to the notion that God ever acts by occasion of anything, and who carry out their theory to the incarnation and its fruits, will find nothing in the Lord’s words to lend countenance to this opinion (Luke 19:10).

The terrible fact of sin is assumed and adequately provided for in the Divine plan which we have to survey. The omniscient God took the full measure of the evil. No created mind was competent even in idea to fathom the guilt of sin or measure its consequences—not to mention our utter inability to expiate the one or reverse the other. The Author of the atonement undertook both; and He alone fully knew what were His own claims as the moral Governor of the universe. To this I refer the rather because many, falling a prey to the excessive subjectivity of modern theories, have lost sight of their relation as responsible subjects to a personal God, and, saturated with a mystic pietism, repose on God merely as a fountain of influences, and not as an authoritative Lawgiver. That is a widely different element from Christ’s teaching. With a vivid sense of the relation in which men stand to the moral Governor, the Biblical doctrine evolves those truths that stand connected with the authority of law and the guilt of disobedience.

a. As to SIN IN ITS OWN NATURE, it implies the Divine Law, and can only be defined as the violation of that law which mankind were under obligation to fulfil. It is either the omission of a duty required—and, in this respect, to come short of love to God with all the heart, with all the soul, with all the strength, and with all the mind, or of love to our neighbour as ourselves, is a sin of omission—or it is the commission of an act which the tenor of the law has forbidden. And there are no sins venial in their own nature. Nay, he who offends in one point is guilty of all; because the mental state from which the disobedience flows argues an inward contrariety to the nature and will of God (Jas. 2:10). The only position which can be laid down as to the criminality of sin is this: the guilt of the offence is proportioned to the greatness, the moral excellence, and glory of Him against whom the offence is committed, and who made us for loyal obedience to Himself. Nothing else therefore comes into consideration in estimating the enormity of sin but the infinite majesty, glory, and claims of Him against whom we sin. Accordingly, the terms used by the Lord to designate sin are noteworthy. He calls it DARKNESS (John 8:12), implying a state of isolation from God, that is an element where God is not. He calls it a TRESPASS (Mark 11:25), implying a violation of law. He terms it a DEBT (Matt. 6:12), involving guilt or liability to punishment. He designates it a LIE (John 8:44), intimating a mental state which either resists or runs counter to divinely-manifested truth.

b. As to the far-reaching CONSEQUENCES OF SIN, these are so manifold and various that they may be said to be the antithesis, or the opposite column, to all the benefits secured to man by Christ’s atonement. It is scarce necessary, therefore, to enumerate the evil effects or consequences of sin; because all that is reversed or annihilated by Christ was entailed on us by sin, was caused by sin. When we trace this contrast and look on the different sides, we win breadth and precision of view. Under the effects of sin we may classify a vast number of bitter evils, such as the forfeiture of our right relation or standing before God; the deterioration of our nature and the entrance of death, temporal, spiritual, and eternal; the departure of the Holy Spirit from the human heart, formed to be His temple; the tyranny of Satan; the gulf formed between men and all holy intelligences, and the like. In a word, whatever is restored by Christ was forfeited by sin."*

This is why I find myself reading more of the older literature from theologians. Soli Deo Gloria!

For His Glory,
Fernando

*Smeaton, G. (2009). The doctrine of the atonement, As taught by Christ Himself (Second Edition) (20–22). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.