Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

to death as an offering to God. 3. That this was done for us, for our redemption and deliverance from the divine wrath; as the passover was sacrificed for the redemption of the Hebrews, when the first born of Egypt were destroyed.

All this is comprehended in the use the apostle has made of those terms: and this will be still plainer, if we attend to the particulars. For the character of our blessed Saviour was answerable in all respects to that of the paschal lamb: he was without blemish, innocent and perfect in his nature; and, as the prophet describes him, like the lamb when brought to the slaughter*, meek and unresisting. When John the Baptist pointed out Jesus to the Jews as the Messiah, he chose to do it in those words, behold the lamb of God t; see and acknowledge the true passover which God himself hath provided, not for the deliverance of a single nation, but to take away the sin of the world. Whatever the law had ordained concerning the offering of lambs in the passover, and in the daily sacrifices of the morning and evening, all is explained in this short reference of John the Baptist, applying the sacrifices of the law to the true lamb of God. In the same gospel of St.

[blocks in formation]

St. John we find another remarkable allusion to the institution of the passover. From the circumstance which happened at our Saviour's death, that his legs were not broken with those. of the two malefactors, the evangelist observes, these things were done that the scripture should be fulfilled, a bone of him shall not be broken; at which passage the margin of our best editions of the bible refers us to Exodus xii. 46. where this direction is given concerning the neither shall ye break a bone thereof.

passover,

If we look to the design or occasion of his sacrifice, we find it the same in effect with that of the passover: for as that was slain for the Hebrews in Egypt, so was He sacrificed for us. The first born of Israel would have been destroyed with those of Egypt, but for the blood of the paschal lamb upon the doors of their houses; and we also who are, as the Hebrews were, in a land of bondage, among sinful people devoted to destruction, shall not escape the divine wrath in that night when the destroyer shall be sent out, but in virtue of the true passover: therefore we are said to have redemption through his blood. The term redemption, as applied to the salvation of sinners by Jesus Christ, is taken in a figurative sense. It signifies literally the release of a captive or guilty person, in consideration of something accepted in lieu of

him.

him. All men are in a state of forfeiture, sold. under sin, and captives of satan: out of which condition, they are not redeemed with silver and gold, as common captives, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot; that is, as the Hebrews were in Egypt by the blood of the passover.

The frame of mind in which we are to celebrate the Christian passover, is described to us in terms borrowed from the Jewish: this feast we are to keep with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth; free from all impure mixtures of worldly affections, pharisaical pride, hypocrisy, and false doctrine. To which those other descriptive ceremonies may be added, of having our loins girded, our shoes on our feet, and our staves in our hands; in the garb and posture of pilgrims, soon to depart from the Egypt of this world.

Some other forms with which sacrifices were offered are of great account, and will explain to us the sense of many passages not otherwise to be understood. Christ as our substitute, is said to have borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; and the Lord is said to have laid on him the iniquities of us all*. According to the form prescribed in the law, when a sacrifice

*Isaiah liii. 4. 6.

was

was brought to the priest, it was the custom for the sinner, or the congregation at large*, as the occasion might require, to lay their hands. upon the head of the victim, and confess their sins upon it, which the innocent animal about to die was to bear for them; and the sins so transferred from the sinner to the offering were to be done away. This shews us what was meant by the prophet, when he said, the Lord hath laid on him the iniquities of us all; that is, he hath laid upon the head of Christ, as upon a devoted sacrifice, the sins of all mankind.

:

In the case of what was called the scape goatt, the animal, with this burden of sin upon his head, was turned loose into a wilderness, into a land not inhabited, no more to be seen of men with allusion to which it is said in the Psalms, as far as the east is from the west, so far hath he set our sins from us ‡, no more to be remembered or heard of to our condemnation. There seems to be another reference to the same in those words of Jer. 1. 20. "the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for, and "there shall be none; and the sins of Judah, " and they shall not be found.”

On

* The elders of the congregation (see Lev. iv. 15.) or the high priest in the name of the congregation. (see Lev. xvi. 24.)

+ Lev. xvi. 22.

+ Psalm ciii. 12.

1

On one particular occasion, the congregation were commanded to lay their hands upon the head of the guilty person, before he was carried out to execution: which ceremony explains what is said of those for whom no atonement was to be accepted, that they should bear their iniquity; they should suffer for it themselves and be their own sacrifice. So again, where it is said, his blood shall be upon his head *, it means that the person in this case should be answerable for the guilt of his own death. And when the Jews blasphemously cried out, his blood be on us and on our children, they meant, that whatever sin there might be in putting Jesus to death, they would venture to have the guilt of it laid upon the heads of themselves and their posterity, and atone for it in their own persons; which they have accordingly, by the just judgment of God, been doing ever since.

This laying of sin upon the head of a sacrifice, gives us a farther understanding of what happened to Christ in his passion, when the curse of our sins was crushed with heavy and merciless hands upon his head, in the form of a crown of thorns; under which afflicting burden he was duly prepared as an offering for sin. Hence we also see the meaning of a like form

VOL. IV.

G

* Joshua ii. 19.

« AnteriorContinuar »