III. It is confidence arising from God’s character alone. He has looked into the face of God and learned, there, that a sinner may trust Him just because of what He is; nay, that a sinner can only glorify Him by trusting Him because of what He is. It is not only because of His grace that he trusts but because of His holiness and power, for these are no longer against the sinner but on his side. Everything in God’s character has, by the cross of Christ, been turned into a reason for trusting Him. The more man knows of Him the more he trusts. Trust is the natural and inseparable response to the soul to the divine revelation of the character of God. It is not what man sees in himself of his good deeds or good feelings, of his graces or his repentance or his regeneration or his faith, but what he sees in God that calls out confidence.
From: Light and Truth, Or, Bible Thoughts and Themes: Old Testament by Horatius Bonar; reprint (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1871 [1867]), p. 164. Meditation on Job 13:18-19. This is from Volume 1 of a 5-volume series of short meditations covering the entire Bible.
Horatius Bonar (1808-1889) was a Scottish Presbyterian minister and prolific author. He was the older brother of Andrew A. Bonar (1810-1892), also a Presbyterian minister and author.
