Let Israel hope in the LORD…He shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities. – Psalm 130:7,8

Recollect what happened to Uzziah. He was a man of God, and a king; but when he had grown very great, he thought that he would act as priest for himself, and go into the sanctuary of the Lord, and burn incense on his own account, without the Lord’s appointed priest; but he was struck with leprosy, and not only was he thrust out, but he, himself, hastened to go out of the temple. I tremble for those in whom I see any sign of going before God in right of their own character. I fear that among God’s own professing people there are some who are so conscious of their own knowledge, and growth, that they pray without Christ, praise without Christ, and talk of being no longer in need of confessing sin. They dare to act without humbly depending upon the presence of the great High Priest; and then they fall into sin, and thus they are struck with leprosy, and, perhaps, to their dying day they can never enter into such fellowship with God as once they knew. I would do nothing without Jesus. I would not even wish to repent except my eye were upon the cross. I would not hope to think a holy thought except as my soul still gazed upon Jesus my all. Away, away with every idea of mercy except it be mercy received through Jesus, for He alone is full of grace, and of His fullness must we receive. I would bind you, brethren, if I could, to the cross as your one hope. I pray the Lord bind me for ever to the cross: the wounds my only founts of hope, the blood and water my only cleansing. Go you who have a righteousness of your own and hope elsewhere; but the long hope of my soul is the bleeding, dying, buried, risen, coming Savior. “Let Israel hope in the Lord: for with the Lord there is mercy,” and with Him alone: all the exercises of faith about mercy must ever be tethered to the cross. Mercy flows through Christ alone. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2199.cfm