THE LAMB "ROAST WITH FIRE"
"Your lamb shall be without blemish.... kill it in the evening, take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it.... roast with fire;... and that which remaineth to the morning ye shall burn with fire."Ex 12: 6-10.
IT was on a cold afternoon in December, when the bitter north wind was sweeping over the hill on the side of which our house stood, and carrying with it showers of fine, hard-frozen snow, that I drew my chair close to the fire and said, "I shall not go out this afternoon. It really too cold." Spreading my hands out over the cheerful glow, I thought with pleasure of „a few hours in the warmth and comfort of my home, and I said to myself very feelingly, "What a comfort the fire is!" But not many minutes afterward, a sudden cry rose from the road without. It was the terrible cry of "Fire! fire!" Half a dozen little boys pealed it forth as they ran with all the speed they could make up the road. A minute later, and "Fire! fire!" shouted the men on the engine, as they lashed their panting horses up the steep hill-side. What a cry that is! None can hear it unmoved. Away went my thoughts of the snow, away went my fears of the cold and the wind, and I was soon hurrying along the road to see where the fire had broken out. In a minute or two I reached the spot, and stood silently before the burning house. Volumes of smoke were rushing out of the upper windows and were oozing up between the tiles of the roof. Here and there busy little flames were creeping rapidly along the window sills, licking with their scorching tongues the beams and rafters of the roof. "How terrible is fire!" I thought, as I watched it working its dreadful work of ruin. With the clatter of many hoofs, with the shouts of many voices, engine after engine dashed up to the spot, and very soon the water was splashing and hissing as it was poured into the glowing furnace within the house. Clouds of white steam now mingled with the gloomy smoke, and the men worked with a will to try and subdue the terrible destroyer. I could not wait to see the end, for a large crowd was gathering, and I went back to my home, and again spreading my numbed hands over the cheering glow, I said as before, "What a comfort the fire is! What should we do without the fire?" Ah! what indeed! Yet how different were its aspects on that December afternoon outside and inside, and how different were the aspects of that other Fire of which we are talking, on that dread night when the Sword of Judgment swept through the land of the Pharaohs, and death was in every house in Egypt and in Goshen! In Egypt each firstborn struck down in judgment, in Goshen the slain lamb, "roast with fire," on which a blood-sheltered people were feeding in haste. What a terror to the one! what a comfort to the other!
And yet pause, and consider. Death was in each house in Egypt, and in Goshen, too; judgment had fallen on each family in both lands alike. It seems to me that a voice cries to our ears, as we gaze at the outstretched sword over Egypt, "God is righteous!" and this is why we see each firstborn die; for God, the holy God, had drawn near in Fire to a sinful nation. But do we not hear the same voice in Goshen, thundering over each bleeding lamb, "God is righteous!"? Yes; there was no difference, all were sinners alike, and the righteousness of God could not waver; God and sin could not meet. If a holy God drew near, death and judgment must sweep on before Him, declaring in awful tones that the supreme Governor of the Universe could not change, that His righteousness must be vindicated, that rebellion and sin must meet their doom.
Perhaps you do not quite understand what "the righteousness of God" means? It means that God, who is holy, governs by law, and, therefore, when He has established what is right and perfect, anything that interferes with the perfection of His ordering must meet with judgment. The interference must be removed for the good of all, so that any breach of His laws must meet with judgment, or righteousness would cease to exist. Even in earthly government, which is imperfect, we see this. The laws are made for the good of all, and any breach of those laws must bring in judgment. Earthly sovereigns are gifted by law with the power of showing mercy to a culprit, but if they do, they only do it through sacrificing righteousness; and woe be to the land where the sovereign does not reign in righteousness! It is right that offenders should be punished. Years ago there was a king in France who loved mercy and did not execute righteousness. He would not sign a death-warrant or maintain the laws of his land. Rebellion soon broke out, blood flowed in streams, no life, no property, was safe. The weak and the feeble were massacred wholesale, and anarchy ran riot. The poor, feeble king tried to fly from the ruin which his weakness had wrought, but he and his queen and his helpless children paid with their lives the dreadful debt to outraged righteousness. Yet is not mercy beautiful? Yes, it is; and it is well that a wise sovereign can use it: for all earthly things are imperfect, and so at times earthly righteousness can be set aside.
There was once a nobleman who had broken the laws of his land by rebelling against the sovereign who was then sitting upon its throne. He was taken prisoner, tried by his peers, found guilty of high treason, and doomed to die. The sovereign signed the death-warrant, and all was settled. But as the day fixed for his execution drew near, his friends tried every means in their power to obtain the royal mercy for him. They tried and they failed. Just at the very last, when all was ready for the dreadful doom—if I remember rightly, it was the very day before—a lady who had entrance to the court thought of a plan which she hoped would touch the heart of the sovereign and bring mercy into power. The condemned man had one little daughter, just twelve years of age, and this lady thought that if she could only get the child into the Queen's presence, she would best plead for her loved father's life. She dressed the poor little girl in the deepest mourning—as befitted the child of a father actually under the doom of death—and then putting a petition for mercy into her hand, led her into a corridor in the palace down which the Queen always passed at a certain hour of the day. "When that door yonder opens," said the lady to the child, "the Queen and her ladies will be coming. The Queen will be the one who walks first; and when she comes near you, you must drop on your knees and offer your petition." Then kissing the pale face of the frightened child she hastily withdrew. Trembling with fear, the little girl waited till the door which the lady had pointed out to her was thrown open, and then the Queen, followed by her ladies, walked slowly towards her. Falling on her knees, the poor little girl held up her petition to the sovereign. The Queen stopped, spoke kindly to the child, and took the paper from her hands; but when she saw the name upon it she frowned deeply, rejected the petition, and moved to pass onward. The little daughter, in her agony and fear, thought all hope was past, and she clung to the Queen's dress, sobbing passionately; she could not speak, but she turned her tear-stained face and looked intently at a portrait hanging on the wall beside them. It was the portrait of the Queen's own father, for whom her father had fought only too faithfully. The Queen's eyes followed the child's. "Why do you gaze so earnestly at that picture" she asked. "Because," sobbed the child, "it seems so hard that my father should die because he was so true to your father." It was done. Mercy sprang into the Queen's heart, and righteousness was bade to stand aside. The sovereign's eyes filled; she stooped and kissed the weeping child, and said, as she passed quietly on her way, "Your father is pardoned."
Thus you see that Mercy and Righteousness could not dwell together; one or the other must be set aside. The law of the land righteously demanded that nobleman's death. That means, that by its decree it was right that he should die; but his little daughter pleaded for mercy so well that the sovereign extended her royal mercy to the culprit, and he lived. Now, as I have said, there was imperfection in this; but there cannot be imperfection with God, or He would not be holy. His broken laws must be vindicated. His judgment must fall, or He would not be righteous. Mercy could not come in like that with Him. Sin is the root of all misery; He could not let it pass undoomed; no sinner could approach His fire-circled throne without perishing. Yet, for all that, God delights in mercy. He is not like the frowning Queen, slow to show it; and we have seen that He Himself purposed in eternity how mercy could triumph and yet Righteousness not be set aside. He planned how the Flaming Sword of Judgment should uphold the righteousness of His throne, and yet His mercy be freely granted to the sinners. That is why there was death in Goshen. 'That is why the Passover lamb bled and died. The righteous judgment on Adam's sin fell there in figure, and the fire, with its burning breath and its leaping flames, made of its flesh food for the sheltered host. It was God's picture. God's own picture of what from His lofty eternity He could always see as if it were present, and that was the Cross of Christ on Calvary's hill; where His Passover Lamb bled and died, and took the stroke of the fiery sword, to declare that Righteousness and Mercy dwell together in a holy God.
Now, you whose ear has heard the call of God, do you own that God was righteous to demand a victim for sin? Do you say God was right? Death and judgment are the necessary doom of rebellion? As soon as you own this, that moment your soul is sheltered under the Passover blood. For the Light of God, that has swept in to your soul's Land of Loneliness through what Christ has done for God—the Light of God shows you that the blood of Christ has answered to God for you, and that death and judgment have fallen on Christ instead of on you. This is how "God is just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus." Seeing this in your soul is faith. The Light of God has shown you that the Passover Blood has been shed and sprinkled for you.
Do you not think that some of the sheltered Israelites trembled very much as the midnight hour drew near? I expect they did. But their trembling did not alter the fact that the blood of the lamb was where God could see it, and He had said, "When I see the blood I will pass over." He did not say, "When you see the blood you shall be saved." Trembling soul, in your gloomy Land of Loneliness! Do you see how you are sheltered by the Blood of Another from the judgment of your sins? And, believe me, the Fire you once dreaded has drawn nigh through that Sacrifice to become your guard, your strength and your comfort. God righteously forgives you. Mercy flows out because Righteousness has been maintained. When you justify God by owning that He could not let Mercy set Righteousness on one side to save you, then He stoops to justify you, and He not only says to your sinful soul, "You are pardoned," but He goes a great deal farther; He says you are "justified freely through His grace." He counts you righteous.
I do not think the Queen ever forgot that that nobleman had been a condemned rebel; his doom was averted, but the stain was still on him. God says of the believer that He justifies him; that is, He sees no stain upon him. Perhaps you say, "How can that be, for I am the same person who sinned?" Well, God says it; accept it; and by-and-by, when you have learned what the Fire has done for you, you will, I trust, understand how vast and complete God's salvation is. "Whom He called them He also justified" (Rom. 8:3030Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified. (Romans 8:30)).