SALVATION FROM THE PLEASURE OF SIN (2)

ctnd from yesterday....

Saved from the pleasure and love of sin. What multitudes of people would strongly resent being told that they delighted in evil! They would indignantly ask if we supposed them to be moral perverts. No indeed: a person may be thoroughly chaste and yet delight in evil. It may be that some of our own readers repudiate the charge that they have ever taken pleasure in sin, and would claim, on the contrary, that from earliest recollection they have detested wickedness in all its forms. Nor would we dare to call into question their sincerity; instead we point out that it only affords another exemplification of the solemn fact that "the heart is deceitful above all things" (Jer_17:9). But this is a matter that is not open to argument: the plain teaching of God’s Word decides the point once and for all, and beyond its verdict there is no appeal. What, then, say the Scriptures?
So far from God’s Word denying that there is any delight to be found therein, it expressly speaks of "the pleasures of sin," it immediately warns that those pleasures are but "for a season" (Heb_11:25), for the aftermath is painful and not pleasant; yea, unless God intervenes in His sovereign grace, they entail eternal torment. So too the Word refers to those who are "lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God" (2Ti_3:4). It is indeed striking to observe how often this discordant note is struck in Scripture. It mentions those who "love vanity" (Psa_4:2); "him that loveth violence" (Psa_11:5); "thou lovest evil more than good" (Psa_52:3); "he loved lies" (Pro_1:22); "they which delight in their abominations" (Isa_66:3); "their abominations were according as they loved" (Hos_9:10); who hated the good and loved the evil" (Mic_3:2); "if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1Jo. Rom_2:15). To love sin is far worse than to commit it, for a man may be suddenly tripped up or commit it through frailty.
The fact is, my reader, that we are not only born into this world with an evil nature, but with hearts that are thoroughly in love with sin. Sin is our native element. We are wedded to our lusts, and of ourselves are no more able to alter the bent of our corrupt nature than the Ethiopian can change his skin or the leopard his spots. But what is impossible with man, is possible with God, and when He takes us in hand this is where He begins — by saving us from the pleasure or love of sin. This is the great miracle of grace, for the Almighty stoops down and picks up a loathsome leper from the dunghill and makes him a new creature m Christ, so that the things he once hated he now loves. God commences by saving us from ourselves. He does not save us from the penalty until He has delivered us from the love of sin.
And how is this miracle of grace accomplished, or rather, exactly what does it consist of? Negatively, not by eradicating the evil nature, nor even by refining it. Positively, by communicating a new nature, a holy nature, which loathes that which is evil, and delights in all that is truly good. To be more specific. First, God save His people from the pleasure or love of sin by puffing His holy awe in their hearts, for "the fear of the Lord is to hate evil" (Pro_8:13), and again, "the fear of the Lord is to depart from evil" (Pro_6:16). Second. God saves His people from the pleasure of sin by communicating to them a new and vital principle: ‘the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit" (Rom_5:5), and where the love of God rules the heart, the love of sin is dethroned. Third, God saves His people from the love of sin by the Holy Spirit’s drawing their affections unto things above, thereby taking them off the things which formerly enthralled them.