I N D E X
`So likewise shall My heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your
hearts forgive not every one his brother their trespasses' (Matt. 18:35).
It is this feature that makes the prayer of Matthew 6:9-13 impossible for
the dispensation of grace.
`And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors' (Matt. 6:12),
and lest we should soften down this comparison, the Lord picked out from this
prayer, this one clause which He expands along the lines of the parable of the
eighteenth chapter:
`For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also
forgive you: but if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your
Father forgive your trespasses' (Matt. 6:14,15).
This is explicit, uncompromising and final.  If this earthly kingdom
principle be carried over into the dispensation of grace it will work havoc.
On one occasion, it was our privilege to hear Archibald Brown preach on
the Parable of the Unforgiving Servant.  Or perhaps we ought to say, he thought
he was preaching on that subject.  His theology and his conception of grace
however prevented him, and we had the joy of seeing this fine preacher
continually referring to Matthew 18, but preaching from his own heart
acquaintance with Romans and Ephesians.  In Matthew we have the Royal Pardon,
the pardon of a king, and in many cases, if not in all, it is conditional.  In
the present dispensation of grace we have Divine forgiveness, which is
unconditional, can never be rescinded, and while it should lead all who are so
freely forgiven, to extend a similar forgiveness to their fellows, this
extension is by no means a condition as it was in Matthew 6 and 18.
`God in Christ' (ho Theos en Christo not as in the Authorized Version `for
Christ's sake') `forgave you' (echarisato humin not as in A.V. `hath
forgiven you') (Eph. 4:32).
`It is the historical fact of Christ once for all putting away sin by the
sacrifice of Himself, which is alluded to, so that we are not to attempt to
change the meaning into a future ("even as Thou, Lord, for Christ's sake, hast
promised to forgive us".  Family prayers by Bishop Blomfield p. 43)', Alford.
In Colossians the case is stated with similar precision:
`And you ... hath He quickened together with Him, having forgiven you all
trespasses' (Col. 2:13).
Here again the aorist participle looks back to an act of God wrought once
and for all in Christ.  The atmosphere of the Gospel according to Matthew is
that associated with a royal throne and with clemency extended by royal
prerogative, whereas, in the great epistle to the Romans, upon which the present
dispensation is erected, the atmosphere is that of a Court of Law, the one
forgiven is not simply discharged as an act of clemency, he goes out acquitted,
he is justified, he has a standing before God in Christ, and these are
priceless, fundamental and radical differences which no amount of pleading can
alter, or zeal exonerate.
We remind our readers that we are in the Muniment Room of this great
house, and that Paul, the Janitor, is exhibiting to our wondering eyes, the
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