When a person first realizes there really is a salvation for sinners, they find it most amazing that this salvation could be for someone as lost and guilty as themselves. They think they must have great sorrow over their sinful life and change their ways. They forget that their sorrow is actually part of their salvation. But, “Oh,” they say, “I must be this and that.” That is true, but it comes as a result of salvation, not as the cause of it. Salvation comes first, then the results. In fact, salvation comes when they can only be described by the hateful, beggarly, despicable, disgusting name,
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It does at first seem most amazing to an awakened man that salvation should really be for him, as a lost and guilty one. He thinks that it must be for him as a penitent man, forgetting that his penitence is part of his salvation. "Oh," says he, "but i must be this and that," all of which is true, for he shall be "this and that" as the result of salvation, but salvation comes to him before he has any of the results of salvation. It comes to him, in fact, while he deserves only this bare, beggarly, base abominable description: ungodly.
