These chapters unfold to us the priesthood, in all its value and efficacy. They are full of deep interest. The very word "priesthood" awakens in the heart feelings of the most profound thankfulness for the grace which has not only provided a way for us to get into the divine presence, but also the means of keeping us there, according The Aaronic priesthood was God's provision for a people who were, in themselves, at a distance, and needed one to appear for them in His presence continually. We are taught in Hebrews vii. that this order of priesthood belonged to the law—that it was made "after the law of a carnal commandment"—that it "could not continue by reason of death"—that the priests belonging to it had infirmity. It could not, therefore, impart perfection, and hence we have to bless God that it was instituted "without an oath." The oath of God could only stand connected with that which was to endure forever, even the perfect, immortal, untransferable priesthood of our great and glorious Melchisedek, who imparts both to His sacrifice and His priesthood all the value, the dignity, and the glory of His own peerless Person. The thought of having such a Sacrifice and such a Priest as He causes the bosom to heave with emotions of the liveliest gratitude. But we must proceed to the examination of the chapters which lie before us. In chapter xxviii. we have the robes, and in chapter xxix. we have the sacrifices. The former have more especial reference to the need of the people; the latter, on the other hand, to the claims of God. The robes express the varied functions and qualities of the priestly office. "The ephod" was the great priestly robe. It was inseparably connected with the shoulder-pieces and the breastplate, The names of the twelve tribes, engraven on precious stones, were borne both on the shoulders and on the breast of the high-priest. (See verses 9-12, 15-29.) The peculiar excellence of a precious stone is seen in this, that the more intense the light which is brought to bear upon it, the more brightly it shines. Light can never make a precious stone look dim; it only increases and develops its lustre. The twelve tribes—one as well as another, the smallest as well as the greatest—were borne continually upon the breast and shoulders of Aaron before the Lord. They were each and every one maintained in the divine presence in all that undimmed lustre and unalterable beauty which belonged to the position in which the perfect grace of the God of Israel had set them. The people were represented before God by the high-priest. Whatever might be How encouraging and consolatory it is for the tried, tempted, buffeted, and self-abased children of God to remember that God only sees them on the heart of Jesus! In His view, they ever shine in all the effulgence of Christ—they are arrayed in divine comeliness. The world cannot see them thus; but God does, and this makes all the difference. Men, in looking at the people of God, see only their blots and blemishes. They have no ability whatever to see further, and as a consequence, their judgment is always wrong—always one-sided. They cannot see the sparkling jewels, bearing the names of God's redeemed, engraven by the hand of changeless love. True it is that Christians should be most careful not to furnish the men of the world with any just occasion to speak reproachfully. They should seek, "by patient continuance in well-doing, to put to silence the ignorance of foolish men." If only they entered, by the power of the Holy Ghost, into the But, thank God, our judgment is not with men, but with Himself; and He graciously shows us our great High-Priest, "bearing our judgment on His heart before the Lord continually." This imparts deep and settled peace—a peace which nothing can shake. We may have to confess and mourn over our constant failures and short-comings,—the eye may, at times, be so dimmed with the tears of a genuine contrition as to be but little able to catch the lustre of the precious stones on which our names are engraven, yet there they are all the while. God sees them, and that is enough. He is glorified by their brightness—a brightness not of our attaining, but of His imparting. We had naught save darkness, dullness, and deformity. He has imparted brightness, lustre, and beauty. To Him be all the praise throughout the everlasting ages! "The girdle" is the well-known symbol of service; and Christ is the perfect Servant—the Servant of the divine counsels and affections, and of the deep and manifold need of His people. With an earnest spirit of devotedness, which nothing could "And thou shalt put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim ["lights and perfections"]; and they shall be upon Aaron's heart, when he goeth in before the Lord: and Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart before the Lord continually." We learn, from various passages of the Word, that the "Urim" stood connected with the communication of the mind of God in reference to the various questions which arose in the details of Israel's history. Thus, for example, in the appointment of Joshua, we read, "And he shall stand before Eleazar the priest, who shall ask counsel for him, after "And thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue.... And beneath, upon the hem of it, thou shalt make pomegranates of blue, and of purple, and of scarlet, round about the hem thereof; and bells of gold between them round about: a golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and "And thou shalt make a plate of pure gold, and grave upon it, like the engravings of a signet, HOLINESS TO THE LORD. And thou shall put it on a blue lace, that it may be upon the mitre, upon the forefront of the mitre it shall be. And it shall be upon Aaron's forehead, that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things, which the children of Israel shall hallow in all their holy gifts; and it shall be always upon his forehead, that they If my reader should happen to be one who is frequently tempted and harassed with doubts and fears, ups and downs in his spiritual condition, with a constant tendency to look inward upon his poor, cold, wandering, wayward heart,—if he be tried with an excessive vagueness and want of holy reality, oh, let him stay his whole soul upon the precious truth that this great High-Priest represents him before the throne of God. Let him fix his eye upon the golden plate, and read in the inscription thereon the measure of his eternal acceptance with God. May the Holy Ghost enable him to taste the peculiar sweetness and sustaining power of this divine and heavenly doctrine. Thus, in all that has passed before us in this chapter, we may see with what gracious care Jehovah made provision for the need of His people, in that He allowed them to see the one who was about to act on their behalf, and to represent them in His presence, clothed with all those robes which directly met their actual condition, as known to Him. Nothing was left out which the heart could possibly need or desire. They might survey him from head to foot and see that all was complete. From the holy mitre that wreathed his brow, to the bells and pomegranates on the hem of his garment, all was as it should be, because all was according to the pattern But there is yet one point connected with Aaron's robes which demands the reader's special attention, and that is the mode in which the gold was introduced in the making of them. This is presented to us in chapter xxxix, but the interpretation comes in suitably enough in this place. "And they did beat the gold into thin plates, and cut it into wires, to work it in the blue, and in the purple, and in the scarlet, and in the fine linen, with cunning work." (Ver. 3.) We have already remarked that "the blue, the purple, the scarlet, and fine twined linen" exhibit the various phases of Christ's manhood, and the gold represents his divine nature. The wire of gold was curiously insinuated into all the other materials, so as to be inseparably connected with, and yet perfectly distinct from, them. The application of this striking figure to the character of the Lord Jesus is full of interest. In various scenes throughout the gospel narrative, we can easily discern this rare and beauteous union of manhood and Godhead, and, at the same time, their mysterious distinctness. Look, for example, at Christ on the sea of Galilee. In the midst of the storm "He was asleep on a pillow" (precious exhibition of His perfect manhood!); but in a moment He rises from the attitude of real humanity into all the dignity and majesty of Godhead, and, as the supreme Governor of the Again, see Him in the case of the collectors of tribute, at the close of Matthew xvii. As the "Most High God, possessor of heaven and earth," He lays His hand upon the treasures of the ocean, and says, "They are Mine;" and, having declared that "the sea is His, and He made it," He turns round and, in the exhibition of perfect humanity, He links Himself with His poor servant by those touching words, "That take, and give unto them for Me and thee." Gracious words!—peculiarly gracious, when taken in connection with the miracle so entirely expressive of the Godhead of the One who was thus linking Himself, in infinite condescension, with a poor, feeble worm. Once more, see Him at the grave of Lazarus. (John xi.) He groans and weeps, and those groans and tears issue from the profound depths of a perfect manhood—from that perfect human heart which felt, as no other heart could feel, what it was to stand in the midst of a scene in which sin had produced such terrible fruits. But then, as the Resurrection and the Life, as the One who held in His omnipotent grasp "the keys of hell and of death," He cries, "Lazarus, come forth!" and death and My reader's mind will easily recur to other scenes, in the gospels, illustrative of the beautiful combination of the wire of gold with "the blue, the purple, the scarlet, and the fine-twined linen;" that is to say, the union of the Godhead with the manhood, in the mysterious Person of the Son of God. There is nothing new in the thought; it has often been noticed by those who have studied, with any amount of care, the Scriptures of the Old Testament. It is, however, always edifying to have the blessed Lord Jesus introduced to our thoughts as "very God and very man." The Holy Ghost has, with "cunning workmanship," wrought the two together and presented them to the renewed mind of the believer to be enjoyed and admired. May we have hearts to appreciate such teaching! Let us now, ere we close this section, look for a moment at chapter xxix. It has been already remarked that Aaron and his sons represent Christ and the Church, but in the opening verses of this chapter Aaron gets the precedency.—"And Aaron and his sons thou shalt bring unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and shalt wash them with water." The washing of water rendered Aaron typically what Christ is intrinsically—holy. The Church is holy in virtue of her being linked with Christ in resurrection life. He is the perfect definition of what she is before God. The ceremonial act of washing with "Then shalt thou take the anointing oil, and pour it upon his head, and anoint him." (Ver. 7.) Here we have the Spirit; but let it be noted that Aaron was anointed before the blood was shed, because he stands before us as the type of Christ, who, in virtue of what He was in His own Person, was anointed with the Holy Ghost, long before the work of the cross was accomplished. The sons of Aaron, on the other hand, were not anointed until after the blood was shed.—"Then shalt thou kill the ram, and take of his blood, and put it upon the tip of the right ear of Aaron, and upon the tip of the right ear of his sons, and upon the thumb of their right hand, and upon the great toe of their right foot, and sprinkle the blood upon the altar round about. But we learn more from the order of anointing in our chapter than the important truth with respect to the work of the Spirit and the position of the Church; we have also set before us the personal pre-eminence of the Son.—"Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; therefore God, even Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows." (Ps. xlv. 7; Heb. i. 9.) This must ever be held fast in the convictions and experience of the people of God. True, the infinite grace of God is set forth in the marvelous fact that guilty, hell-deserving sinners should ever be spoken of in such terms—should ever be styled the "fellows" of the Son of God; but let us never for
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