CHAPTER II.

THE DYING MALEFACTOR.

Luke xxiii. 32-43.

THE crucifixion of the Lord Jesus was so ordered as to furnish a striking illustration, at once of the depth of his abasement, and the certainty of his reward. To enhance the agony and the shame of his death, he was crucified between two thieves-being numbered with transgressors-placed on the same level, in the public view, with men whose lives had been justly forfeited by their crimes, and subjected, in his last moments, to the painful spectacle of their sufferings ;but, to evince the certainty of his reward,-to make it manifest that the joy which was set before him, and for which he endured the cross, despising the shame, would be realized,—and to give him as it were a pledge in hand, that "he should see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied," one of the thieves who suffered along with him was suddenly converted; and, in the lowest depths of the Redeemer's humiliation,-in the darkest hour of the power of darkness, when Satan's policy seemed to be crowned with complete

success, this immortal soul was snatched as a brand from the burning, and given to Christ as a pledge of his triumph, and the first-fruits of a glorious harvest. While others mocked and reviled him, and when his chosen disciples stood aloof, the dying malefactor relented his conscience awoke-his heart was touched; and, amidst the ridicule, and the execrations, and the blasphemies of that awful hour, one solitary voice was heard, issuing from the cross beside him, which called him "LORD," and which spake of his “ KINGDOM" in accents of faith, and penitence, and prayer. And how must that voice have gladdened the Saviour's heart! and imparted to him, in the midst of his bitterest agony, a foretaste as it were of the "joy that was set before him,"-exhibiting, as it did, a proof of the efficacy of his death, the faithfulness of God's covenant promise, and the certainty of his reward! for if, even now on the cross, and before his work was finished, this stricken spirit fled to him for refuge, and was quickened into spiritual life in the very hour of death, was it not a sure pledge and earnest, that he should yet bring many sons and daughters to glory, when, being by God's right hand exalted to the throne, he should receive the promise of the Father, and shed forth the Spirit from on high?

I. In reference to the state of this man's mind before the time of his conversion, nothing is recorded that would lead us to suppose that he had ever thought seriously of religion, or acquired any knowledge of the Gospel, until he was brought to Calvary. He is described as a malefactor, and more specifically

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as a thief or robber-a desperate character-fearing neither God nor man, whose crimes exposed him to the highest penalties of the law; and his own confession admits the justice of the sentence under which he suffered "We receive the due reward of our deeds." On a comparison of the parallel passages in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, it would seem that at first he had joined with the other malefactor in reviling the Saviour; for, in the one, it is said, "The thieves also which were crucified with him, cast the same in his teeth ;" and, in the other, “ They that were crucified with him reviled him ;"-expressions which may, indeed, be interpreted, generally, as descriptive of Christ's extreme humiliation in being subjected to reproach from such a quarter,—this class of men being spoken of as partaking in the crime of embittering his last moments, just as the soldiers are said to have filled a sponge with vinegar, because one or more of them did so; but if they be understood as applying specifically to each of the two, they are sufficient to show that, at first, the one who was converted was as ungodly and as guilty as the other.

But immediately before his conversion, and preparatory to it, a change seems to have been wrought in the state of his mind,一 change which consisted in a deep conviction of sin, and a just sense of his own demerit on account of it. For when one of the malefactors railed on Jesus, the other answering "rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing that thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds." The

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whole process was so suddenly accomplished in this case, that it is difficult to say whether, in the order of time, the convictions which are expressed in this remarkable confession preceded, by any perceptible interval, his cordial reception of the truth; but as, in the order of nature, conviction precedes conversion, we may consider it as part of his experience, while as yet he was in a state of transition from darkness to light. The words of his confession imply—that his conscience, which, by the commission of crime, might have been seared as with a hot iron, was now deeply impressed with a sense of sin; and it was a true sense of sin,-not the mere sorrow of the world which worketh death;" but godly sorrow, working towards genuine repentance: for, although the condemnation of which he speaks might be the temporal sentence of death, pronounced and executed by his fellow-men, his language shows, that he viewed his guilt with reference not to men merely, but to God also-to God, as the supreme Lawgiver and the final Judge. As a resident at Jerusalem, or at least in Judea, the seat of true religion, he had probably enjoyed some of the advantages of early religious instruction, and had been taught some of the elementary truths of Scripture ; for he speaks of God, the only living and true God, whose name he knew and feared, although he had lived in the violation of his law. The thought of God as a Lawgiver and Judge was now vividly present to his mind; and the conception of God's character, combined with the inherent power of conscience, which, even in the breasts of the most depraved, is

never altogether extinguished, produced that conviction of sin which is invariably accompanied with the fear of God, and of a judgment to come. So long as God can be kept out of view, there may be a secret consciousness of guilt, without any sensible alarm, or apprehension of danger; and hence the malefactor's question to his hardened fellow-sufferer-" Dost thou not fear God?" but so soon as God is present to the mind, every conscience intuitively connects guilt with danger, and awakens fear of the wrath to come, for conscience intuitively points to God as a Judge-to God as an avenger.

But, in the case before us, as in every other, where there is a commencement of a work of grace in the heart, conviction of sin was accompanied, not only with the fear of danger, but with such a sense of demerit, as led to the acknowledgment, that punishment was justly deserved. This is not always implied in the mere terrors of an awakened conscience, and would be altogether repudiated by a conscience still asleep. The malefactor who railed at Jesus might not be able to deny his guilt, and he might yield himself as a passive and unresisting victim to the arm of public justice, merely because he could not, by any resistance, escape from the punishment of his crimes; but had he been asked to acknowledge that he justly merited the bitter death which he was called to endure, he would, too probably, have denied that he was so guilty as to deserve such a punishment, and complained of the hardship and severity of his case. In reference to God, the supreme Judge, and the retri

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