THE terms “infinite” and “eternal,” which have their meaning in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in the Godhead glory, are necessarily brought down into time and connected with this world by the incarnation of our Lord. Yea, farther still, for in “the Word made flesh,” all, that such a One said and did, whether in life or in death, whether in resurrection out of the grave or in ascension to the glory at the right hand of God as Son of Man, only manifests fresh glories in the person of Him who could not be otherwise than infinite and eternal.
Every believer in Christ has found the preciousness of these words, infinite and eternal (not to speak now of others), as attaching to the work which He accomplished upon the cross for the glory of God and our salvation.
Who would dare to question the meaning of eternal and infinite as bound up together in securing these two grand objects of His life and mission? Or who would be allowed to, doubt their value as applied to the blood which He shed as the Lamb of God? Was not that blood infinite in its efficacy, both for God in the height of His holiness and for us in the depth of out sin and guilt? Were not His suffering and death eternal in their value, as meeting the offended majesty and sovereignty of the throne of God; or must they be endured again and again? Which of us, whose consciences have been once and Forever purged “by the precious blood of Christ,” would allow the intrusion of a thought, much less a blasphemous doubt, of the full meaning of those blessed words, ETERNAL and INFINITE? Must they and we be cleansed anew? If so, it must be by blood that is neither infinite in its efficacy nor eternal in its value, if His be not. For it is the blood of Jesus, the-Son of the living and true God, “that inhabiteth eternity,’ which is in question, if at all.
So if we quit the cross, and the sepulcher, and the Lord’s everlasting victory over death and sin and Satan’s power, and think of Christ in heaven, having “sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high, because He had by Himself purified us from our sins,” must He rise up, and come forth to be offered often, because the work is found to be neither infinite nor eternal in its efficacy and value towards God or towards us? Is this the Christ, the Lamb which God provided? Which of us would not indignantly say, “No!”
And now we may transfer these words to a lower level still, and look at their meaning and application to ourselves, whether as believers or unbelievers, in time or for eternity, and to be realized in infinite bliss above or in everlasting misery below. There is nothing in our own being that can be the adequate reason why such words should find their further and future development in our histories, whether for weal or for woe; but the secret lies in this―that sin and transgression are infinite in their character of offense, because committed against God and all that He is in His own holy nature, and in whose presence evil cannot dwell. A finite and innocent creature, as Adam was, may commit an offense which is infinite in its character and extent, because of what God is―an offense, moreover, to expiate which nothing but the atoning sufferings and death of Him “who thought it not robbery to be equal with God,” and whose sacrifice was therefore infinite and eternal in its value, could be of real and efficacious avail. The propitiation was offered to God, for it was against Him the original outbreak was made by “the liar and murderer from the beginning.” Adam, through temptation, trampled underfoot the majesty of the Creator, and the rights of God as the sovereign and supreme ruler, by handing himself over as a rebel to Satan. All this was but the beginning of what was, in itself, infinite and eternal in its character against the rights and claims which the nature and being of God demanded, though the sin―this enormous sin―was committed in this world, and by a creature into whose nostrils God had breathed the breath of life.
What Adam was, and where he was, could not alter the offense, which, I repeat, was against God in all that He is. Would the devil make his mark lower than this, think you, and be the same devil? He could not deny the power and title of the Creator to create, but he would and did―devil that he is―snap the links between the wonderful creature that God had formed in His own likeness and the Creator. Yea, he would oblige God in righteousness to drive him out into the hand of hint who had fallen already—fallen” as lightning from heaven.”
This was the nature of the original outbreak of sin in the first man. Who can measure the nature and extent of the calamity of an outbreak like this? Have men who deny the eternity of punishment hereafter forgotten all this? Do they never hear the groaning of creation now, at this present time? Do they never witness the curse upon the around as they walk over it? And do they never think why “death passes” upon men all around them, and on themselves too? Do they never find or realize these terrible proofs of judgment, when clothing and craping themselves from head to foot and burying the dead out of their sight? Again, do they never get a gleam into this prison-house, from the bright “bow in the cloud” ―the witness that God remembers His covenant with Noah, that He will not again destroy the world by the waters of a flood, as He had done? Does his hand so effectually wipe away “the sweat of the brow” from the weary, that everything and everybody is consciously set free from “the creation curse” which still lies heavily upon the ground?
What of that “other Sinai curse” which rests heavier still upon man himself, who labored hard, but failed to put himself right with God by “works of law”? Is not the manner and measure of rebuke and infliction heavy enough in this world, and in man’s daily life, to lead him to think that these judgments in his natural existence, followed by death, are but the hidings of this power, against the day of far more terrible judgments in the second death?
But, again, and yet more important than the one man’s offense, and our transgressions, whether under the law or without law, is the vast outbreak of the world’s enmity, headed up at the cross and energized once more by Satan, the enemy of God and man, when the time was come for the sending forth of the Son of God’s love into this world. Sin, born out of this hate, then took a character which creation and the fall of man could not give it, but which the rejection and crucifixion of Christ did. At the cross, and by the cross, it mounted up to its enormous height, and broke over all bounds, and became in its nature infinite and eternal, as committed against God and “God manifest in the flesh.”
And God, who was in the midst of men in patient grace, and as they were, “reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them”; and this, be it remembered, was a sin which cannot be measured by the responsibility of the creature in creation, nor of man under the law, but by the rejection of the Father and the Son whom God sent forth to be the Saviour of the world And now, we may ask, is this offense and murder of God’s only and well beloved Son finite or infinite in its character and outburst, though committed by finite beings? Was this hate against love―divine love―led on by the prince of this world, for a day or a year, think you? Was it local and temporal, or infinite and eternal? Can it be counted upon the records of time? What must be the everlasting wrath of God against such enmity, and all those who take part in it, by refusing to accept eternal life and eternal redemption, through faith in the precious blood of Christ? Salvation is eternal the things which are not seen are eternal―our house in the heavens is eternal―the purpose of God in Christ is eternal―the weight of glory is eternal―and our inheritance is eternal. On the other hand, damnation is eternal (Mark 3:2929But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation: (Mark 3:29)) ―judgment is eternal (Heb. 6:22Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. (Hebrews 6:2)) ―the vengeance of fire is eternal (Jude 77Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. (Jude 7)).
(Extract from paper by J. E. B.)