In Matt. 1:21, it is said of Christ, “Thou shalt call His name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins.” [“from” not “in.”]
Many desire to know how they may obtain this salvation. in the first place, we learn through the word of God that Jesus, our great Exemplar, lived a life of perfect obedience to the requirements of the law of the Father. “Sacrifice and offering thou didst no desire; mine ears has thou opened; burnt offerings and sin offerings has thou not required. Then said I, Lo, I come; in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, Thy law is within my heart.” Ps. 40:6-8.
As the law of God was in the heart of our saviour, so must it be in the hearts of His followers. “hearken unto Me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law; fear ye not the reproach of men, neither be ye afraid of their revilings. For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool; but my righteousness shall be forever, and my salvation from generation to generation.” Isa. 51: 7, 8
Perhaps some may be in doubt as to this law that Christ and His people have in their hearts. We believe it can be made clear to any reasonable mind that it is the law whose “Commandments are righteousness” (Ps. 119:172), the law that shows what sin is (John 3:4); in other words, the law given on Sinai. In proof of this position we present the following scriptures:—
“Thy testimonies that thou has commanded are righteous and very faithful.” The righteousness of thy testimonies is everlasting.” Ps. 119:138, 144. Where did God command testimonies, and what are they? “And He gave unto Moses, when He had made an end of communing with him upon Mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God.” Ex. 31:18. “The tables were written on both sides; on the one side and on the other are they written.” Ex. 32:15, What was written on thes tables of stone?—
Under the new covenant dispensation, this is to be written in the hearts of God’s people. Jer. 31:33: “I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts.” When persons allow this law to be written in their hearts, and are baptized in the name of the Father whose law they have transgressed, of the Son who died for them, and of the Holy Spirit by whose agency God writes His law in their hearts, they will find pardon for all their sins. Their desire to walk after the flesh will be gone, and they will take delight in walking after the Spirit; and they will find their minds in perfect harmony with all the precepts of the law of God, which are spiritual. Rom. 7:14. “Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not.” 1 John 3:6
Thus through our Lord Jesus Christ we are saved from sins past, and from knowingly committing sins in the future. “He saves His people FROM their sins.”
The Advent Review and Sabbath Herald Oct. 24, 1882
Deut. 30:20 “That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life, and the length of thy days: that thou mayest dwell in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.”
Jer. 38:20 “But Jeremiah said, They shall not deliver thee. Obey, I beseech thee, the voice of the LORD, which I speak unto thee: so it shall be well unto thee, and thy soul shall live.”
1Jn. 5:3 “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.”
2Jn. 1:6 “And this is love, that we walk after his commandments. This is the commandment, That, as ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it.”
Rev. 14:12 “Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.”
Rev 22:7 “Behold, I come quickly: blessed is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book.”
Rev 22:12-14 “And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.”