B.C. 1452. "The bravest tro he accounts life a continual warfare, and his prayers then best become him when armed cap-à-pie. He utters them like the phy ever man ob- great Hebrew general, on horseback. He casts a smiling contempt tained, is that upon calumny; it meets him as if glass should encounter adamant. which o'er him- He thinks war is never to be given over but on one of these three self, himself bath gain'd.-Earl of conditions,-an assured peace, absolute victory, or an honest Sterling. death. Lastly, when peace folds him up, his silver head should d Sir T. Overbury. lean near the golden sceptre, and die in the prince's bosom.< Joshua is selected and charged 18-23. (18) a. . spirit,a not insight, wisdom: but spiritual endowment requisite for the office he was called to fill. (19) charge.. sight,d that he might feel his responsibility, and a De. xxxiv. 9; they own his authority. (20) honour, eminence, dignity, authority. (21) Urim, see Ex. xxviii. 30. (22, 23) and.. congregation, elders. Is. lxiii. 11. b Knobel. c Keil. d De. xxxi. 7. e Nu. xi. 17; Jo. i. 16, 17. f De. xxxiii. 8; 1 S. xxviii. 6; Ezra Ps. lxxiii. 24. "A man ought to carry himself in the world as an e A leader's qualifications (v. '18).-I. It may be useful to note that the qualifications of Joshua were not overlooked in his appointment. II. He had exercised his gifts before he was appointed to the command. III. His crowning qualificationthat from which all other elements of fitness grew-was his possession of the Spirit of God. ii. 63; Pr. iii. 5, A good man.-A good man, though unlearned in secular 6: Jos. ix. 14; knowledge, is like the windows of the temple-narrow without Ju. xx. 18-23; and broad within; he sees not so much of what profits not abroad; but whatsoever is within, and concerns religion and the glorification of God, that he sees with a broad inspection; but all human learning without God is but blindness and folly. One orange-tree man discourses of the sacrament, another receives Christ; one would if it could discourses for or against transubstantiation; but the good man walk up and down in the gar- feels himself to be changed, and so joined to Christ that he only den, swinging understands the true sense of transubstantiation, while he becomes perfume from to Christ bone of His bone, and flesh of His flesh, and of the every little censer it holds up to same spirit with his Lord. From holiness we have the best the air."-Beecher. instruction. For that which we are taught by the Holy Spirit of "A just person God, this new nature, this vital principle within us, it is that knows how to which is worth our learning; not vain and empty, idle and insigsecure his own nificant notions, in which, when you have laboured till your eyes reputation, withblemishing are fixed in their orbs, and your flesh unfixed from its bones, you another's by dis- are the reproof of heresies, for the detection of no better and no covering his wiser. If the Spirit of God be your teacher, He will teach you faults."--Quesnel. such truths as will make you know and love God, and become like to Him, and enjoy Him for ever, by passing from similitudes to union and eternal fruition.g out g J. Taylor. offerings continual burntoffering a Le. i. 1, 2, 1013; 1 Pe. i. 19, ii. 22; Is. liii. 7; Ge. xxii. 8: He. ix. 14; Jo. i. 29; Re. xiii. 8, xxi. 23. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH. 1-8. (1, 2) offering, etc., see Le. ii. 1, 2. in.. season, at the prop. time. (3-8) offering.. Lord,a see Ex. xxix. 38-42. The morning and evening sacrifice.-Let us consider-I. The matter of which this offering consisted. 1. The lamb: the type of Christ; 2. The meat-offering and the drink-offering. II. The manner in which it was presented. Many offerings were only occasional; but this was stated, and was renewed daily throughout the year. The things we should particularly notice are-1. The union of the different materials; 2. The frequency with which they were offered; 3. The increase of them on the Sabbath- B.C. 1452. day.b v. 7. "Strong wine, Heb. she car, not intoxicating drink, but dis. fr. water as strong drink as simple drink." "The Targum Word for offerSafety in Christ.-We lately read in the papers an illustration ing here is corof the way of salvation. A man had been condemned in a ban; see Mk. vii. Spanish court to be shot, but being an American citizen, and also 11., of English birth, the consuls of the two countries interposed, and declared that the Spanish authorities had no power to put him to death. What did they do to secure his life when their protest was not sufficient? They wrapped him up in their flags, they covered him with the Stars and Stripes and the Union Jack, and defied the executioners. "Now fire a shot if you dare, for if you Keil. do so you defy the nations represented by those flags, and you here understands will bring the powers of those two great empires upon you." it of old wine. There stood the man, and before him the soldiery, and though a But the explanasingle shot might have ended his life, yet he was as invulnerable tion prob. is that as though encased in triple steel. Even so Jesus Christ has taken the Israelites in my poor guilty soul ever since I believed in Him, and has wrapped around me the blood-red flag of His atoning sacrifice, and before God can destroy me or any other soul that is wrapped in the Atonement, He must insult His Son and dishonour His sacrifice, and that He will never do, blessed be His name ! c 9-15. (9, 10) sabbath, etc., the Sab. offering here appointed for the first time. (11-15) in.. months, i.e. at the new moons. This off. here commanded for the first time. Sabbath offerings.-I. They pointed to Him who, by the sacrifice of Himself, obtained a Sabbath of rest for all. II. They indicated the right spirit of real Sabbatarians in the old time. Trust in the Messiah whom the lambs prefigured. III. They kept constantly in mind the Great Deliverer, through whom they would enjoy the rest of heaven. the wild. had, in Spk. Comm. sabbath and Origen, Op. ii. 356. pended (Am. viii. some presented Mercy better than sacrifice. When the Romans had ravaged In aft. times the the province of Azazene, and seven thousand Persians were new moon bebrought prisoners to Amida, where they suffered extreme want, came a feastAcases, bishop of Amida, assembled his clergy, and represented day trade susto them the misery of these unhappy prisoners. He observed, 5); the pious that as God had said, "I love mercy better than sacrifice," He sought instrucwould certainly be better pleased with the relief of His suffering tion (2 K. iv. 23); creatures, than with being served with gold and silver in the yearly thankchurches. The clergy were of the same opinion. The consecrated offering (1 S. xx. vessels were sold; and with the proceeds the seven thousand 6, 29). Some abstained fr. fastPersians were not only maintained during the war, but sent home ing; hence ref. to at its conclusion with money in their pockets. Varenes, the by prophets as a Persian monarch, was so charmed with this humane action, that feast resembling he invited the bishop to his capital, where he received him with the Sabbath (Is. i. 13; Hos. ii. 13; the utmost reverence, and for his sake conferred many favours on Ez. xlvi. 1). the Christians. the passover a Ex. xii. 6, 18; Le. xxiii. 5; Ex. De. xvi. 1--8; 16-25. passover, see on refs.a Offerings of wh. particulars offerings at not bef. prescribed, the same as that of new moon. Christ's sacrifice. We have read of Leonidas and his brave three hundred stopping the ravaging march of the Persians at xii. 27, 48-49; Thermopylæ, and devoting themselves to the salvation of their country. We have read of the King of the Locrians, who when his son had broken the laws, the demand of which was that both eyes should be put out, mitigated the punishment by giving, in exchange for one of them, an eye of his own; thus enduring, Ex. xiii. 6-10, xxxiv. 18. v. 15-21. Saurin, ii. 519. v. 21. J. Glas., iii. 168. B.C. 1452. self-devotedly, a part of the suffering allotted to his child. We have read of the queen who sucked the poison from the "Among the Jews, the wave- wound of the king, her consort, though convinced that death offering was would be the consequence of her heroic act. And numerous waved horizon- have been the instances wherein soldiers have caught the deathtally to the four blows intended for their commanders, not merely risking, but points, and the heave offering devoting, their own lives for the salvation of a life which they heaved up and held to be more important than their own. And is such conduct down, to signify that He was Lord reprobated by the general mass of mankind? Far from it. Why of heaven and then should the sacrifice of Christ be ? b earth."-Bowes. b T. Ragg. firstfruits a Ex. xxiii. 16, xxxiv. 22; De. xvi. 9, 10, Nu. XV. 19-21. "As trembling on the waft of wind or 26-31. also.. firstfruits,a see Le. xxiii. 15, 22. The doctrine of sacrifice.-All nations have offered sacrifice to some beings whom they have deified. There is no region where the pilgrim's foot can travel where you will not find offerings, some sanguinary, some libidinous, some foolish, but all to propitiate the anger, or secure the protection, of some fancied object flowers of worship. There comes a cry groaning out of the great heart carry dewdrops, of humanity, "What is the acceptable sacrifice?" Strange diviedges of the nations and streaming altars; cakes for the queen of heaven, petals, and ready and prostrations before the brazen image; children for the to fall at the first insatiate Moloch passing through the scorching fire-these are brush of bird, so the responses from classical and pagan times. African Feticism, the heart should Hindoo immolations, and Burman cruelties, and the atrocities carry its beaded of savage cannibalism-these are the hollow answers from the words of thanks- uninstructed consciences of heathens. Cold morality and rubrical giving; and at the first breath exactitude, and sacramental efficacy, and ascetical self-denialof heavenly fla- these are the polite and conventional theories of modern forvour, let down malism. And so they are successively offered, and the worfumed with the shippers look and strain their eyes eagerly for the accepting fire. heart's grati- All is silent. The clouds are dark above, and there is no voice, tude." H. W. nor any that regardeth the cold, and proud, and cruel sacrifice. But yonder, crouching in very humbleness of attitude, with eye that he almost fears to lift, but that yet, struggling through their tears, fasten their far, deep gaze upon the Crucified, there is a poor contrite sinner without an offering, save that he offers himself; without a plea, save that he is guilty, and that Christ hath that were not the died; without a hope, save in the multitude of God's tender guardian angels mercies; and clouds roll harmlessly away, and the sky clears, so keen-sighted, and the lambent fire leaps down, and the voice speaks from the gether overlook Man at the right hand, "The sacrifices of God are a broken and them." -H. W. a contrite spirit; a broken and a contrite heart God will not despise." the shower, per Beecher. men's souls that almost destitute they would alto Beecher. b Dr. Punshon. feast of trumpets a Nu. x. 1-10; Ps. lxxxi. 3; Is. CHAPTER THE TWENTY-NINTH. 1-6. and.. month, etc.,a see Le. xxiii. 24, 25. Trumpets. Look at some of the modern trumpets. These may be divided into-I. The censurable. These are many-very loud, and, we fear, very popular. There is the trump of-1. Bigotry; 2. Adulation; 3. A corrupt evangelism; 4. Vanity; 5. Cant; 6. Officialism. II. The commendable. There is the trump of the civil yr., cor- 1. Genuine philanthropy; 2. Reverent devotion; 3. Spiritual responding to xxvii. 13; Ps. lxxxix. 15. "The first mo. of our Sept. It was, incentive. in fact, the new The fulness of the Atonement.-Oh! who shall measure the Cir. B.C. 1452. contemporary flourish of trum heights of the Saviour's all-sufficiency !-first tell how high is sin, and then remember, that as Noah's flood prevailed over the tops of earth's mountains, so the flood of Christ's redemp- had been celeyear's day wh. tion prevails over the tops of the mountains of our sins. In brated among the heaven's courts there are to-day men that once were murderers, Heb. and other and thieves, and drunkards, and whoremongers, and blasphemers, nations with and persecutors; but they have been washed, they have been great festivity sanctified. Ask them whence the brightness of their robes hath and joy, and come, and where their purity hath been achieved, and they, with ushered in by a united breath, tell you that they have washed their robes, and pets. This ordimade them white in the blood of the Lamb.c-Meaning of the nance was deAtonement.-In Acts vii. 26, occurs the expression "set them at signed to give a one." To set at one is to reunite, reconcile: the familiar word religious character to the occa"atonement," at-one-ment, is derived from this, and means sion by associ"making at one, reconciling." The Christian atonement is the ating it with great Sacrifice for sin made by Jesus Christ, by which God is some solemn obmade at one-to us, and by accepting which we are made at one Comm. with God. It servances."-Port. b Dr. Thomas. Ro. viii, 32. b T. Fuller. v.7-10. R. Sheringham, De Sacri ficiis Joma, Codex 7-11. tenth. . month," the great day of atonement, see c C. H. Spurgeon. Le. xvi. and xxiii. 26-32. day of The doctrine of the Atonement.-If the doctrine of atonement humiliation by the cross of Christ be a Divine truth, it constitutes the very a Is. lviii. 3—7, substance of the Gospel, and consequently is essential to it. The liii. 6; 1 Co. xv. doctrine of the cross is represented in the New Testament as the 56, 571 Jo. ii. 2; grand peculiarity and the principal glory of Christianity. occupies a large proportion among the doctrines of Scripture, and is expressed in a vast variety of language. Christ "was delivered for our offences, wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities;" "He died for our sins," &c. In fine, the doctrine Talm. of the cross is the central point in which all the lines of evan-The mind is gelical truth meet, and are united. What the sun is to the never right but system of nature, that the doctrine of the cross is to the system when it is at of the Gospel; it is the life of it. The revolving planets might peace within itas well exist and keep their course without the attracting in- self; the soul is fluence of the one, as a gospel be exhibited worthy of the name while it is in the that should leave out the other.Atonement above law.-Atone- flesh, if it be of its ment is not an expedient contrary to law, but above law. It is purged natural corrupwhat law, as law, cannot contemplate. It is introduced into an tions, and taken administration, not to execute the letter of the law, but preserve up with Divine "the spirit and the truth of the constitution. The death of thoughts and Christ is an atonement for sin committed, it is a public expres--Seneca. sion of God's regard for the law which has been transgressed; c Dr. T. W. Jenand it is an honourable ground of showing clemency to the trans- kyn. gressors.c in heaven even contemplations." feast of "The offs. re were the largest of all. 12-34. fifteenth month, feast of tabernacles, see Lev. xxii. 34-36, 39-43. Dist. above all the other feasts of the tabernacles yr. by the gt. num. of burnt-offerings, wh. raised it into the greatest festival of joy. . . . The reason for this multiplication quired at this in the num. of burnt-offerings is to be sought for in the nature feast of the F. itself. Their living in booths had already visibly repre- They amounted sented to the people the defence and blessing of their God; and to 14 rams, 98 the foliage of these booths pointed out the glorious advantages lambs, and no of the inheritance received fr. the Lord. But this festival less than 70 bullocks; being foll. the completion of the ingathering of the fruits of the twice as many orchard and vineyard, and therefore was still more adapted, on lambs, and four B.C. 1452. times as many bullocks as en joined for the The acc. of the rich harvest of splendid and costly fruits wh. their inheritance had yielded, and wh. they were ab. to enjoy in peace now that the labour of agriculture was over, to fill their hearts with the greatest joy and gratitude towards the Lord and giver of them all, and to make this festival a speaking representation of the blessedness of the people of God when resting from their labours."a passover. F. of tab. was esp. one of thankfulness to God for the gift of the Vain sacrifice. He that offers in sacrifice, O Pamphilus! a fruits of the multitude of bulls and of goats, of golden vestments, or purple earth, and the quantity and the garments, or figures of ivory, or precious gems, and imagines by nature of the offs. this to conciliate the favour of God, is grossly mistaken, and has were determined no solid understanding; for he that would sacrifice with success accordingly."- ought to be chaste and charitable, no corrupter of virgins, no adulterer, no robber or murderer for the sake of lucre. Spk. Comm. a Keil. 35-40. (35-38) eighth, etc., see Le. xxiii. 36. (39) vows, see Le. vii. 16. peace-offerings, see Le. iii. 1. (40) told, minutely. all.. Moses," in ref. to sacrifices, etc., of this and previous chapter. Christian fidelity.-There have been men on this earth of God's, of whom it was simply true that it was easier to turn the sun from its course than these from the paths of honour. There have been men like John the Baptist who could speak the truth which had made their own spirits free, with the axe above their neck. There have been men, redeemed in their inmost being by Christ, on whom tyrants and mobs have done their worst, and when, like Stephen, the stones crashed in upon their brain, or when their flesh hissed or crackled in the flames, were calmly superior to it all." The reward of fidelity.— Servant of God, well done, well hast thou fought Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms; Than violence; for this was all thy care, To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds on vows CHAPTER THE THIRTIETH. 1-5. (1) heads, etc., see i. 4-16, vii. 2. (2) vow," engage a De. xxiii. 21; to give, or do, something for God. bond, deny himself some Ec. v. 4-6; Ps. pleasure or privilege. (3) being.. youth, under her father's lxxvi.11; Na.i.15; power: i.e. not betrothed or married. (4) father.. her, i.e. not Ps. xxii. 15, lxvi. forbid the fulfilment of her vow. (5) father,' with his wider 13, 14, xvi. 14; experience and knowledge. disallow, forbid. forgive, the non-performance of her vow. Ju. xi. 30, 35. b 1 Ti. iii. 4; Ep. vi. 1-3; Col. iii. 20; He. xii. 5, 6. On v. 2, see Serm. by Bp. Sanderson and Francis Squire; J. M. Wynyard, B.D. Religious vows.-I. Vows made to the Lord should be made thoughtfully, as befits the nature of Him to whom they are made, and the circumstances of him who makes them (contr. Jephthah's rash vow). II. Vows so made should be religiously observed. He who breaks a vow with God may not be trusted to keep his word with man. |
