Sir.—The scriptural order of cleansing before atoning has often puzzled me. Can any of our more deeply, taught brethren explain it? We are, I think, in the habit of considering the atoning blood to be the foundation of all that we are in the way of holiness and acceptance with God: yet, when the twin ideas of purification and expiation are presented to us in Scripture, under whatever variety of language or symbol, they stand in this order so uniformly that it can hardly be otherwise than significant.
For examples, the leper had first to wash and then to bring the sacrifice whose blood was to atone: so throughout the various washings with sacrifice. Again, in Heb. 6:22Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. (Hebrews 6:2), “the doctrine of washings (not baptisms—see Greek) and of laying on of hands;” that is, the doctrine of cleansing” and of transfer of sinfulness to the sacrificial victim. Again, in 1 Cor. 6:1111And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Corinthians 6:11), but ye have been washed, but ye have been sanctified, but ye have been (justified, i.e.) pronounced free from condemnation. Again, 1 John 5:66This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth. (1 John 5:6), (see Greek,) this is he that cometh through water and blood, Jesus, the Christ, not with the water alone, but with the water and the blood. This by the way is a very important declaration of God, in the present day, when Socinianism, Rationalism, Neology, &c., concur in saying that Christ saves by “water alone;” that is, by causing or promoting, in one way or another, my personal cleansing henceforth; and not by blood,” by His death as an expiatory sacrifice. But to return to out question, How is it that the blood is not placed first Again, “there are three that bear witness, the Spirit and the water, and the blood.” Again, 1 Cor. 1:1010Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. (1 Corinthians 1:10), “Christ Jesus is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption." I have quoted merely those passages which occur to me without seeking them.
But further, not, only is this order observed when the purification relates to the great work once for all, at our new birth, but even in its less fundamental aspect of progressive development or growth of the “new man” created in us as shown by his more and more resisting the “old man,” and so bringing our natural powers more and more into the service of the new man. This brings me to a passage which though, as an example, it is too uncertain to serve as a basis for my question, yet it was the first which suggested the question to lay mind long ago, and led me to the other passages. “He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood,” &c. Most Christians, probably, suppose these two forms of expression to signify the same thing; but I think not, both because the two are so frequently repeated even in modified forms, as “my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed,” and yet without abbreviation by the omission of one; and also from a consideration of their precise spiritual import by comparison with similar types in other Scriptures. The eating the flesh, like the feeding on a portion of the offering of old, denotes our drawing spiritual sustenance and strength from contemplating and appropriating to ourselves Christ, as regards His offices, doctrine, and personal character, as we receive, and assimilate natural food so that it goes to form ourselves; while another remarkable and unexplained fact is, that while the figurative idea of drinking the blood of Christ our sacrifice is inculcated in the New Testament, both by word here and by act in the Lord's Supper; yet it is expressly and repeatedly forbidden in the Old Testament, not for mere physical convenience, but emphatically on account of the symbolic meaning of blood, in the Mosaic rites which were pre-eminently types of the doctrines of Christ.
I feel that some profitable thoughts must be involved in the true reason of each of these circumstances.
W. P.
A. The main point is met completely by the expression in 1 Peter 1., “Sanctified unto the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ.” We are born again to have a share in the value of Christ's blood and work. When the things are named together in Scripture, sanctification is before justification. Ordinary language is very different. Righteousness is not so put, because that is the foundation of God's dealing in blessing with us and bringing us, by that regeneration which sets us apart from Him, into the full acceptance of Christ. Grace reigns through righteousness. There is practical progress then in holiness.
The use of John 6 goes somewhat further and differently into the matter. Chap. 5. had presented the Son of God as quickening whom He would. In the latter, it is sovereign life giving; in the former, it is appropriated by faith, and this of the Son of man; i.e., the Lord come in flesh. Hence He is the bread that cometh down from heaven. But it is not the Christ to the Jews, received as born on earth, but the Son of man (the word made flesh) giving life to the world. He must be received in this character. And to receive Him in this character in which alone is life, we cannot stop short of His death. We must eat His flesh and drink His blood. This is His death—the blood separate from the body. Incarnation is of no avail for life—unless death comes in: otherwise there is no atonement—sin is not put away. “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit.” Eating the flesh comes first, because it is the first prominent, point of incarnation—Christ comes in flesh for man, for the world. Drinking the blood is added because that is available as a dead Christ—the blood out of the body. Hence the monstrous character of the refusal of the cup in Romanism, as well as the doctrine of concomitancy (that is, that the blood is in the bread or alleged body of Christ). The forbidding of blood in the Old Testament denoted that man in the flesh could not meddle with death. Life belongs to God. Our drinking Christ's blood shows that through His death we come in freed from flesh as dead; and that death thus is life and liberty to us, deliverance from the old man and its guilt, too, to us who have received the quickening of John 5.