The Transitive Love of God
Mercy and Goodness, or Transitive Love By mercy and goodness, we mean the transitive love of God in its two-fold relation to the disobedient. Scriptures such as Titus 3:4; Romans 2:4; Matthew 5:44-45; John 3:16;II 2 Peter 1:3; Roman 8:32; and John 4:10 serve as examples. Mercy is that external principle of God's nature which leads him to seek the temporal good and eternal salvation of those who have opposed themselves to his will, even at the cost of infinite self-sacrifice. Goodness is the eternal principle of God's nature which leads him to communicate of his own life, and blessedness to those who are like him in moral character. Goodness, therefore, is nearly identical with the love of complacency; mercy, with the love of benevolence. Good People not necessarily saved people. The eternal and perfect object of God's love is in his own nature. Men become subordinate objects of that love only as they become connected and ...