Invitation Through Warning

24 FEBRUARY

Now consider this, yet that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver. 

Psalm 50:22

SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: Isaiah 55

This verse offers the kind of severe teaching that is absolutely necessary in dealing with hardened hypocrites, who otherwise would deride all instruction. While the psalmist threatens his listeners with the intent of alarming them, he also offers them the hope of pardon if they hasten to avail themselves of it.

To prevent them from further delay, he warns them of the severity and suddenness of divine judgment. He also charges them with base ingratitude for forgetting God. What remarkable proof we have here of the grace of God in extending the type of mercy to corrupt men who have impiously profaned His worship, who audaciously and sacrilegiously mocked His forbearance, and who abandoned themselves to scandalous crimes!

In calling them to repentance, God extends to sinners the hope of reconciliation with Himself so that they may venture to appear in the presence of His majesty. Can we conceive of greater clemency than this, to invite himself and into the bosom of the church such perfidious apostates and violators of His covenant, who have departed from the doctrine of godliness in which they were brought up?

Great as it is, we would do well to reflect that it is no greater than what we ourselves have experienced. We too, have drifted away from the Lord, and only in His singular mercy have been brought back by the Lord into His fold.

John Calvin

FOR MEDITATION: As parents, we often warn our children about threatening dangers even as we protect them from those dangers. With that in mind, how do God’s warnings to us in chapters such as Psalm 50 and Isaiah 55 and books like Hebrews and Revelation actually promote the perseverance of the saints?

365 Days With Calvin

Selected and Edited by Joel R. Beeke