undeserved. It springs entirely from the overflowing love
of his own heart, and is not caused by anything in them.
We strove against God's love at first--
Jesus knocked at the door, but we would not open to him;
he invited, but we would not come;
he called, but we would not hearken.
We can say with deepest grief we treated
our best friend most shamefully--
He knocked at our door in the night with his hair wet with dew and
his locks filled with the drops of the night, but we regarded him
not. In sloth and pride we remained in the bed of indolence and
self confidence, and we would not rise to let him in. And we can
testify, that if his love could have been conquered, we would
have conquered it; for we shot out the envenomed shafts of
ingratitude, we held up against him perpetually the shield of
our hard-heartedness, and if he could have been overcome, if he
were not an Almighty Saviour, we would have defeated him,
and have been still his enemies.
We affirm that the divine love of Christ is a love which many
waters cannot quench, and which the floods cannot drown.
- Spurgeon's sermon, "A Psalm of Remembrance"