Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Eternally inexhaustible love

Below, John Murray's commentary on Romans 8:32 which reads: He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? (ESV)

If restraint had been placed upon the power of the enemy, he would not have despoiled the forces of darkness and made a show openly of the principalities and powers. He would not have triumphed over them and bound the effectively to the triumphal chariot of his cross. Is this not further proof of the Father's grace, that he should have given over his Son to the malignity and hate, the ingenuity and power of the prince of darkness and his hosts? It was the Father who delivered him up, not the host of darkness. "Who delivered up Jesus to die? Not Judas, for money; nor Pilate, for fear; not the Jews, for envy;-but the Father, for love!"

It is only as the ordeal of Gethsemane and Calvary is viewed in the perspective of damnation vicariously borne, damnation executed with the sanctions of unrelenting justice, and damnation endured when the hosts of darkness were released to wreak the utmost of their vengeance that we shall be able to apprehend the wonder and taste the sweetness of love that passes knowledge, love eternally to be explored but eternally inexhaustible. (Murray, John. The Epistle to the Romans: the English Text with Introduction, Exposition and Notes -Volume 2. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1968. Print. 324-325)

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