Question: Is “spiritual” in 1 Cor. 10:33And did all eat the same spiritual meat; (1 Corinthians 10:3). 4 used in its ordinary signification? If so, what is the meaning of “spiritual meat” and “spiritual drink?”
Answer: The Apostle did not mean that the Israelites did not eat actual meat, and drink actual drink, but that what they did feed on is typical of the spiritual food which is now the sustenance of the believer’s new life.
Answer: Practically setting the seal of death upon all that was merely human, in order that the life he had received the life of Jesus might be seen in power in all his actions.
Answer: As Christ Himself was made a gazing-stock when lifted up on the Cross, so He, by His glorious work, so overcame the powers of darkness that their defeat became public, and shown, openly everywhere by the preaching of the gospel.
Answer: Containing not mere love and amiability, but that preservative principle of godliness and truth that renders it truly wholesome. Observe, it is not to be of salt seasoned with grace (too often left out). That is to say, it is to be primarily of the grace that we ourselves have received. Caustic and bitter speeches would not come under this description.
Question: In what sense is Christ the end of the law for righteousness?
Answer: Because in Christ the righteous requirements of the law, demanding the death of the sinner, are fully met.
Answer: Some have sought to explain this by supposing the evil of judgment is meant, and not the evil of sin, but the word used is that generally used for evil and wickedness. There are mysteries in the origin of evil that no human mind can fathom.
Evil is either natural or moral. Natural or physical evil comprehends all the afflictions, adversities, trials, and bereavements which can happen to man in this life, whether in mind, body, or estate. Of this sort of evil the Lord is sometimes said to be the Author. Job, when laboring under the pressure of loss of property, family bereavements, and above all a loathsome and malignant disease, was advised by his wife to curse God and die (by his own hand, I suppose). But he sharply rebuked her, and said, “What! shall we receive good at His hand and not evil?” and in this he did not sin with his lips. Thus Job evidently looked upon God as being the Author of all the calamities which befell him. (Job 2:1010But he said unto her, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh. What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips. (Job 2:10).)
In Heb. 12:55And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: (Hebrews 12:5) we find chastisement spoken of as coming from the hand of the Lord. Here it is a class of trials from without, but God acts in them; as a father, He chastises us. It may be that they come, as in the case of Job from Satan, but yet the hand and wisdom of God are in them. Thus I may use a rod to correct my son. The rod, however, is but the instrument by which the chastisement is inflicted. My hand limits the extent of the punishment.
He does not create moral evil: it is temporal evil as contrasted with peace—not with good.