God's "Dulcinea" To Us

Greg Bahnsen wrote:

Up in Los Angeles there is a kind of a redoing of an old musical that is one of my favorites, the Man of La Mancha. You may remember this as the musical and light opera rendition of Cervantes' Don Quixote. Don Quixote was the idealistic Spaniard who went about, as his enemies would remind you, tilting at windmills - the man who didn't seem to have a lot of common sense - who didn't live in a down to earth way. And a musical was made about the story of Don Quixote, and it does include the story of Dulcinea in it.

Dulcinea was a common whore. There's not a nice way to put it. She was not just a fallen woman, she was an absolutely polluted woman. And somehow this naive, idealistic, head in the clouds guy, Don Quixote, came across her and considered her his lady. And Don Quixote wished to serve her as his lady.

Toward the end of the musical, when Don Quixote has fallen and is about to die, Dulcinea, who has been treated and honored as a lady by him and she cannot understand why, says:

Can you not see me for what I am? You honor me and care for me despite my spotted record, that I had nothing pure to offer you.

And she comes to him as he is dying and there she is bowed down and as he awakens from his coma and sees her there and says:

What, you my lady, bow down to me? How inappropriate.

And we all sit there with tears in our eyes thinking what's wrong with you, Don Quixote; she doesn't deserve this kind of love. She doesn't deserve this kind of honoring. Because, you see, Don Quixote could only see her as his lady, as a pure, honorable woman.

The doctrine of justification is God's "Dulcinea" to us. I don't understand why God would give His Son for me, I'm not worth it. And I don't see how He can declare my record to be innocent, how He can declare me to be righteous because I'm not. But it is as though He sings the Dulcinea to me, but He says:

I only see you as righteous for the sake of My Son.