The sentence is passed. It is impossible that it should not be
executed. When God has done all, and sees that the point of
hopelessness is reached, or when the time has for other reasons come,
then He lets the sentence take effect. He kept back the destroying
angels from Sodom, but He sent them forth at last. There is a point in
the history of nations and of men when iniquity is 'full,' and when
God sees that it is best, on world-wide grounds or personal ones, to
end it. So there come for nations and for individuals crises; and the
law for the divine working is, 'A short work will the Lord make on the
earth.' For long years Noah was building the ark, and exposed to the
scoffs of a generation whose sentence had been pronounced and not yet
executed; but the day came when he entered into its covert, and 'the
flood came and destroyed them all.' For generations He would fain have
gathered the people of Jerusalem to His bosom 'as a hen gathereth her
chickens under her wings, and they would not'; but the day came when
the Roman soldiers cast their torches into the beautiful house where
their fathers had praised Him, and sinned against Him, and it was left
unto them desolate. Let us not be high-minded nor victims of our
levity and inconsiderateness, but fear.
Let us remember too that the intensity of the execution is aggravated
by all the sins committed during the delay. By them we 'treasure wrath
against the day of wrath.' He says to His angels at last 'Now,' and
the sword falls, and justice is done. 'The mills of God grind slowly,
but they grind exceeding small.' The sum of the whole matter is, every
evil of ours is sentenced already; the punishment is delayed for our
sins, and because Christ has died. God is wooing our hearts, and
trying to win us to love Him by the holding back of the sentence which
we are daily abusing. Shall we not accept His forbearance and take His
gifts as tokens of the patient tenderness of His heart? Or are we to
be like 'the brutes that perish,' knowing neither the hand that feeds
them, nor the hand that kills them. The delay in rendering 'the just
recompence of reward' only aggravates its weight when it falls. As in
some levers, the slower the motion, the greater the force of the lift.