AND have you the forgiveness of your sins?" I said to a countrywoman; who was standing behind her butter-basket one market day.
“Oh! yes," was her confident reply.
“Will you tell me what is your ground for saying so?”
“Why, that I am doing my best, and that I pray to be forgiven every day.”
“And where do you find in God's word that He saves anyone on that ground?”
“I am sure it says in many places in the Bible that we shall be saved if we pray to be forgiven, but I can't just remember where it is.”
“I am sure you cannot, for it is not there.
Suppose I stole a pound of this butter of yours, would you let me off because I kept saying, ' Please forgive, please forgive me'?”
A decided shake of her head was her only reply.
No, nothing short of full payment for her butter would have satisfied her, but she could not see that nothing short of full atonement for sin would' satisfy God's holiness.
Instead of finding in the Bible that we shall be saved if we pray to be forgiven, we see there that Christ died and shed His blood to atone to God for sin, and that it is in virtue of this, and this alone, that God for-gives the sinner who turns to Him.
We fear this poor woman voiced the ignorance of very many as to God's salvation. Oh! that they could see how fully and freely He forgives those who come to Him as lost sinners. But this forgiveness is based on Christ's atoning work alone.
"He took the guilty culprit's place
And suffered in his stead.”
“Through this Man [Christ Jesus] is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins: and by Him all that believe are justified from all things." (Acts 13:38, 39). F. A.