BAMIDBAR

IN THE WILDERNESS

4 The one lamb shalt thou offer in the morning, and the other lamb shalt thou offer at even;

As for "the daily sacrifice"--the morning and evening lamb --we instinctively say as we look towards Christ "Behold the Lamb of God". With him in head, in heart, and hand, the true worshippers now draw near.

Not now with a bleating animal with literal blood poured out, but with the recollection of faith in

"the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot"

who verily was fore ordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest" in the last times of Judah's history (1 Pet. 1:19-20), we come to God in prayer every day.

We cannot come otherwise acceptably. We are sinners who can claim no attention on our own behalf. We have to say with Daniel:

"We do not present our supplications before thee for our righteousness, but for thy great mercy";

and His great mercy has taken this form: Christ crucified and given us as the form of our approach--combining God's great exaltation and our great humiliation. Every time we bend the knee, it is in the name of Jesus, crucified and raised, as the declaration of God's righteousness; and this "every time" is very often.

It is not limited to public assembly. It was morning and evening in the type, and it is not less frequent in the antitype. And every time we thus "offer unto God the voice of thanksgiving," it is required that we do so with the mental discernment of the slain lamb of the antitype.

That is, we are required to have Christ crucified before our minds as the basis of our permitted approach--not as an innocent substitute on whom our punishment has been inflicted, but as a representative perfect elder brother, in whom God's righteous dealing with sin has been exhibited, for our humble endorsement that the way of mercy may be open for healing--in forgiveness and deliverance.

With the two lambs to be offered "day by day for a continual burnt offering"-

Law of Moses Ch 20

The Meal offering

Meat--that is, bread--(for it is a modern association that identifies "meat" with the article only that is supplied by the butcher; no vegetarianism intended)--meat is for strength; wine for gladness (Psa. 104:15).

What can be the meaning of their addition to the lamb of the daily sacrifice, but this, that the service of God is not all humiliation and sorrow and solemnity? Israel were early taught the joyful side of their relation with God. On the further side of the Red Sea, on the morrow after their thrilling deliverance from Egyptian pursuit, they sang under the leadership of Moses,

"The Lord is my strength and song' and he is become my salvation",

The Psalms of David are divine exemplification of the class of sentiment that is appropriate to the divine relationship in the present evil state. True, there is much shadow in them, it is not possible in human language to express deeper sorrow than some of them reflect. But there is more light than darkness: more joy and jubilance than lamentation. Most of them are in this vein:

"0 clap your hands, all ye people; shout unto God with the voice of triumph . . . Make a joyful noise unto God, all ye lands; sing forth the honour of his name: make his praise glorious . . . Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise to the God of Jacob. Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the psaltery .... With trumpets and sound of cornet make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King. Let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein. Let the floods clap their hands: let the hills be joyful together."

Joy belongs to faith in God and knowledge of His purposes and His way. There is no true joy apart from it. It means the full activity of the highest faculties of man--which cannot be realized in connection with any other exercise of the human mind. Science or sport brings only a part of the human brain into action; godliness--(of the enlightened sort--and there is no other true sort, for the godliness of darkened sectarianism is no more true godliness than sewer gas is fresh air)--godliness brings the whole brain into action, and therefore kindles noble joy.

"Thou hast put gladness into my heart more than when their corn and wine are increased."

It was appropriate therefore that a meat offering and strong wine should always accompany the sacrificial lamb, morning and evening.

That these three things--the light of knowledge, the incense of prayer, and the sacrificial condemnation of sin--should be the subjects of the daily service of the tabernacle, is an illustration not to be mistaken as to the places which these things should have in the lives of His people.

They condemn the loose thoughts of moralists, who would relegate all three to the region of uncertainty and neglect. They condemn no less the fraternal Laodiceanism that can only be roused by polemics, and who regard the daily worship of God as a weariness.

They show us the sort of people whom God approves, and they throw the right light upon the various kinds of worldliness that are unfit for the service of the true sanctuary.

"The Lord hath chosen the man that is godly for himself ": and these institutions of the Lord's house admit us to the divine estimate of the man that is godly. Many men in the truth have a name to live and are dead: the chill of their spiritual corpses is liable to infect living saints with a sense of shiver, who have to keep close to the fire to drive the cold away.

Law of Moses Ch 28.

6 It is a continual burnt offering, which was ordained in mount Sinai for a sweet savour, a sacrifice made by fire unto Yahweh.

"He hath given himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet smelling savour" (Eph. 5:2)

It was not necessary to prove his obedience, for this had been abundantly put to the test during a whole life without sin. There was a deeper reason: and in the contemplation of this deeper reason, we may understand how the death of Christ was "a sweet-smelling savour" to the Eternal Father. This deeper reason is hinted at by Paul in the statements that, God thus "condemned sin in the flesh" (Rom. 8:3) and set forth Christ crucified as a declaration of his righteousness (3:25) in the destruction of the devil having the power of death (Heb. 2:14) that "the body of sin might be destroyed" (Rom. 6:6, 10).

When we apprehend the principle that underlies these phrases, we may understand how the tragedy which they describe should be to God "an odour of a sweet smell." The principle involved is the supremacy of God and the absolute ascendancy of His will in the ways of man. This principle was set aside in the transgression of our first parents, and has been set aside ever since in the life of their posterity—in consequence of which, death reigns.

Sunday Morning 299

8 And the other lamb shalt thou offer at even: as the meat offering of the morning, and as the drink offering thereof, thou shalt offer it, a sacrifice made by fire, of a sweet savour unto Yahweh.

The sabbath day.

So the seventh thousand years, though an age of rest or Sabbath-keeping, will be a day of special activity in the service of God through all the earth, in the ways appointed, with Jerusalem and the temple as the centre of the rushing currents of national life.

Commerce will no longer be the be-all and end-all of national enterprise.

"Many nations shall go and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths"

Law of Moses Ch 28.

9 And on the sabbath day 2 lambs of the 1st year without spot, and 2 tenth deals of flour for a meal offering, mingled with oil, and the drink offering thereof:

The sabbath day.

So the seventh thousand years, though an age of rest or Sabbath-keeping, will be a day of special activity in the service of God through all the earth, in the ways appointed, with Jerusalem and the temple as the centre of the rushing currents of national life.

Commerce will no longer be the be-all and end-all of national enterprise.

"Many nations shall go and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths"

Law of Moses Ch 28.

On the seventh day, which was neither longer nor shorter than the days which preceded it, "God ended His work which he had made;" and because of this notable event, "He blessed and sanctified it." A day is blessed, because of what is or will be imparted to those who are commanded to observe it. The sanctification of the day implies the setting of it apart that it might be kept in some way different from other days. The manner of its original observance may be inferred from the law concerning it when it was enjoined upon the Israelites. To them it was said,

"remember the sabbath day to keep it holy."

If it be asked, how was it to be kept holy? the answer is,

"in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor any one or thing belonging to thee; "

and the reason for this total abstinence from work is referred to the Lord's own example in that "He rested the seventh day." The nature of its observance in the ages and generations, and the recompense thereof, is well expressed in the words of Isaiah; --

"if thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath from doing thy pleasure, on My holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable; and shalt honour Him not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it" (Isaiah 58:13, 14).

In this passage the conditions are stated upon which faithful Israelites might inherit the blessing typified by the rest of the seventh day. They were joyfully to devote themselves, to the way of the Lord. They were not simply to abstain from work, yawning and grumbling over the tediousness of the day, and wishing it were gone, that they might return to their ordinary course of life; but they were to esteem it as a delightful, holy, and honorable day.

Their pleasure was to consist in doing what the Lord required, and in talking of "the exceeding great and precious promises" he had made. To do this was "not speaking their own words," but the Lord's words. Such an observance as this, however, of the Sabbath day, implies a faithful mind and a gracious disposition as the result of knowing the truth.

Neither antediluvian nor postdiluvian could "call the sabbath a delight," who was either ignorant or faithless of the import of the promise

"thou shalt delight thyself in the Lord, and ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed with the heritage of Jacob."

(continue on daily post)

Elpis Israel Ch 2

On the Sabbath day, the daily sacrifice was to be doubled... Why double work on the day of rest? The answer is to be found in the meaning. Joseph told Pharaoh:

"For that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, it is because the thing is established by God" (Gen. 41:32).

Two lambs in the morning and two lambs in the evening had both one meaning. They were doubled on the seventh day for emphasis, because of the foreshadowing of the day.

Law of Moses Ch 20

11 And in the beginnings of your months ye shall offer a burnt offering unto Yahweh; two young bullocks, and one ram, seven lambs of the first year without spot;

"Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day. For this was a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob" (Psa. 81:3-4).

On that day, the first day of the month--marked and dated by the advent of the new moon--there was to be a large addition to the daily sacrifice. There were to be seven lambs, two young bullocks, and one ram, besides the daily lamb of the morning and evening; and these additional burnt offerings were to be accompanied by proportional meat offerings and wine offerings in the quantities specified, in addition to which, there was to be an offering of one kid of the goats for a sin offering.

This was a more casual, yet a larger, form of special service than the Sabbath or the daily: once in thirty days as compared with once in seven days or twice in one day. Its occasion was the completion of a larger cycle of the divine beneficence to man. It takes the moon about thirty days to perform her circuit round the earth. All the benefits she confers in that circuit, we cannot know. Some of them we know.

She prevents stagnation in the waters of the earth by causing their rise and fall and so giving us the tides. She mitigates the darkness of night, and even imparts to it a silvery beauty, which is often more acceptable than the glory of the day. She exercises subtle magnetic influences on the condition of earth's inhabitants which we cannot estimate. She gives us a standard of time measurement which is of greater value than familiarity allows us to appreciate.

That the periodicity of such an ordinance in nature should be chosen as the occasion of a special recognition of man's relation to God, is significant. It shows that God finds pleasure in our appreciation of His works. It shows that He disapproves of the indifference that takes them all as a matter of course. There is a liability in men to do this. Accustomed to the automatic operations of the laws of nature, they are liable to become insensible to the eternal power and wisdom in which they have their root. In a sense, the motions of nature are a matter of course.

They are established and cannot be interfered with: yet they are not reasonably regarded, if considered without reference to the contriving energy in which they had their origin. "He commanded, and they were created. He hath also established them for ever and ever. He hath made a decree which shall not pass." To look at them and not admiringly recognize the wisdom that has made them is to be like a cow or any other beast--which dimly looks, sees, feels, but does not understand--well enough in its place, but only as fattening flesh to be eaten. "0 Lord, how great are thy works! Thy thoughts are very deep. A brutish man knoweth not; neither doth a fool understand this" (Psa. 92:5). "The works of the Lord are great, sought out of all them that have pleasure therein" (Psa. 111:2).

What man, who has made some great and clever thing, does not enjoy the appreciation of intelligent visitors? What man gets any satisfaction out of the unintelligent gaze of the uninitiated? If this be so with us, who are in the faint image of the Creator, we may understand why God should delight in the recognition of His works by the intelligent creatures He has made, and why He should have selected the completion of the moon's monthly journey for a special exercise in this direction.

There is an evident counterpart to the Mosaic monthly institution in the blessed age that is coming with the advent of the saints to power. It is" from one new moon to another", as well as from Sabbath to Sabbath, that all flesh appears in the temple courts to worship (Isa. 66:23). It is "every month" or once a month, that the Apocalyptic wood of life (the saints) yields its fruit for the healing of the nations (Rev. 22:2), and it is "according to his months" that the literal tree on both sides of the temple river yields its fruit "whose leaf shall not fade, neither shall the fruit thereof be consumed . . . the fruit thereof shall be for meat, and the leaf thereof for medicine" (Ezek. 47:12).

There will be no monotony in a state of things in which the whole population is roused with the advent of every new moon in the heavens to a special service of worship and praise, and a special distribution of healing and blessing. The prospect of the Kingdom is a prospect of an endless succession of joyful activities.

But what nation, as at present constituted, would care for the activities of holiness? It is "when thy judgments are made manifest" that "all nations will come and worship before Thee" (Rev. 15:4; Psa. 86:9; 29:27-29; 102:16-22; Isa. 26:9). Till then, the only kind of activity that appeals to the general taste is the activity of the racecourse or the circus, or the theatre, and other polluted forms of public life. There are to be "new heavens and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness" Among many detailed features of delightfulness will be the monthly recurrence of special feasts of praise, joy, and blessing.

Law of Moses Ch 28.

The Passover, which was at the commencement of the first feast of firstfruits; Pentecost, which was at the commencement of the second feast of firstfruits; and the Feast of Tabernacles, after gathering in the harvest of corn and wine; were inchoately fulfilled in the sacrifice of Christ our passover; the gathering of the firstfruits of the apostolic labours; and the ingathering at the end of their exclusive labours in Judea, after which "the stranger," or Gentiles, became a gleaning of the corners of the field.

These feasts have only had a springing, or germinant, which I have styled an inchoate, accomplishment; but will have their fructiferous, or terminal, fulfillments after the appearing of the Lord in his kingdom.

The passover, pentecost, and the feast of tabernacles, were commemorative and typical; commemorative of the destruction of Egypt's firstborn, and Israel's deliverance; of the giving of the Law; and of their dwelling in tents in the wilderness. They were typical of things spiritual and sectional, and spiritual and national: sectionally, they were typical of things pertaining to the "Sect of the Nazarenes" during the apostolic ministration of the Spirit, as already stated in brief.

Nationally, the passover typifies the future vengeance on the Gentiles, and the deliverance of Israel and the saints who are passed over at the appearing of the Lord; the pentecost, the wave-manifestation of the firstfruits, and giving of the law from Zion; and the feast of tabernacles, the Lord's salvation, or rest for Israel and the nations, which come up to Jerusalem to keep the festival there.

Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Oct 1855