I will not execute the fierceness of my anger. I will not return to destroy Ephraim: For I am God, and not man; the Holy One in the midst of you; And I will not come in wrath.
We must here first remember, that the Prophet directs not his discourse promiscuously to all the Israelites, but only to the faithful, who were a remnant among that corrupt people. For God, at no time, suffered all the children of Abraham to become alienated, but some few at least remained, as it is said in another place, (1 Kings 19:18.) These the Prophet now addresses; and to administer consolation, he moderates what he had said before of the dreadful vengeance of God. This saying then was not to relieve the sorrow of hypocrites; for the Prophet regarded only the miserable, who had been so smitten with the feeling of God’s wrath, that despair would have almost swallowed them up, had not their grief been mitigated. This is one thing. But further, when he says that he is God, and not man, this truth ought to come to our minds, that we may taste of God’s gratuitous promises, whenever we vacillate as to his promises, or whenever terror possesses our minds. What! Do you doubt when you have to do with God? But whence is it, that we with so much difficulty rely on the promises of God, except that we imagine him to be like ourselves? Inasmuch then, as it is our habit thus to transform him, let this truth be a remedy to this fault; and whenever God promises pardon to us, from which proceeds the hope of salvation, how much soever he may have previously terrified us by his judgements, let this come to our mind, that as he is God, he is not to be judged of by what we are. We ought then to recumb simply on his promises. “But then we are unworthy to be pardoned; besides, so great is the atrocity of our sins, that there can be no hope of reconciliation.” Here we must take instant hold on this shield, we must learn to fortify ourselves with this declaration of the Prophet, He is God, and not man: let this shield be ever taken to repel every kind of diffidence. 