Oh, the sense of pardoned sin. By Charles Spurgeon.

Psalm 103, verses 1 through 3. Praise the Lord, O my soul, all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget any of His benefits, who forgives all your sins.

The most wonderful aspect of this verse is the attribute of God which David selects for special praise. all my inmost being praise his holy name. You might have expected to read gracious name or merciful name, but you find it written holy name. Indeed, this is the emphatic point of the text, that an impeccably holy God would forgive our sin.

He is a holy God, righteous, just, and pure, who cannot look upon iniquity, whose fury burns against evil, Therefore, it is astonishing that He should forgive our iniquities. To accomplish this wonder, the miracle of the sin-atoning cross was wrought by His unspeakable love.

You must have a true idea of that holiness which is like a consuming fire, that holiness which even angels cannot gaze upon, but of which they sing, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, The whole earth is full of His glory. You have but to gain a glimpse of that unutterable perfection, and you will abhor yourself in dust and ashes. And then you will marvel to think that the thrice-holy God should have spared your guilty soul.

How abhorrent is your depravity in His sight, and yet He does not smite you. What are you but a mass of corruption? and yet the infinitely pure One has considered you in love? What are you but a sink of impurity, and yet the all-holy God has looked upon you in compassion?

While you were rotting away with the leprosy of sin, the Lord visited you in pity to show that there was nothing good in you to earn His redeeming love, while you still had your thinking perverted. your affections polluted, and your desires depraved. Even while you were full of the sinful plague of your own heart, God says to you, I have forgiven you.

In your confessed guiltiness, the holy God will forgive your sin by an act of both justice and mercy. Plead your guiltiness and say, Lord, pardon my iniquity, for it is great. You must cast all your splendid righteousness onto the rubbish heap, right along with all your heinous iniquities, and the ever-flowing stream of Christ's sin-atoning blood will wash it all away.

You must cast all your prayers, your charities, and your good works on the same rubbish heap as your sins, You might have tried to sort them a little, but one is so much like the other that you must fling all your good works and all your bad works overboard and swim to glory on the sin-atoning cross.

Though God is glorious in holiness, He is also glorious in mercy and grace. Do you sincerely trust in the sin-atoning sacrifice of Jesus to save you? then every grain of your sin is as far removed from you as the east is from the west. He has hurled the whole of your sin into the unfathomable depths of his ocean of mercy.

Oh, the sense of pardoned sin! If indeed the royal pardon has been sent to you from the court of heaven, then you may heartily sing, Praise the Lord, O my soul, all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget any of His benefits, who forgives all your sins.