A.—It is stated that Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for it. This He did in perfect love, though nothing was to be seen loveable but hateful and guilty.
Next, it was His for (not redemption only, but) an actual result agreeable to the divine nature; that He might sanctify it, or set it apart to God from all evil, having cleansed (or cleansing) it through the washing of water by (or in) the word. The entire work of sanctification, first and last, in principle and in practice, is here set forth luminously under the well-known figure of the washing of water, but carefully tying it to God's word, not to a sign or ordinance, whatever its place.
The blessed issue is, that He might present to Himself the church glorious, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. The word employed is not “laver,” (which in fact never occurs in the N. T. but often of course in the Greek Version of the Ο.T.), but “hath water,” and hence “washing.” The absence of the Greek article with the qualifying term ἐν ῥήματι is strictly correct, though English like most other tongues cannot dispense with it, as thereby it makes the word to characterize the washing. Nor could any instrument but God's word applied by the Spirit effect that purifying process all through.
But it is Christ's love, which accomplishes now the sanctification of the church, as it was before that His love in which He gave Himself for it on the cross. And His love will complete the work when He presents the church all glorious at His coming, the heavenly bride of the Second man, the Last Adam. It is well to note that in this connection “the Lord” is quite out of place in the Received Text of ver. 29. It should be “Christ” as the best witnesses testify and the truth itself requires.
Q.-Deuteronomy, or Deuteronomy, which is correct? and what is the meaning of the word?
J. S. (Mount Auburn, Mass., U.S.A.)
A.-If intelligent usage be allowed to decide, the former is correct; and etymology also favors the word so formed from the Greek. It means a second edition or repetition of the law, being the title of the fifth book of Moses given by the Septuagint translators. The Jews as usual designate each book by the opening Hebrew words. It may be added that there is no real ground to doubt, save in the unbridled fancy of rationalists, that it was (save the last chapter or at least its last part) written, as it professes to be, by Moses. As to its scope and contents, Deuteronomy presents a practical direction in the spirit of prophecy for life in the land, given from the east of Jordan, and looking onward to the final restoration of Israel after captivity, “the secret things” of grace after total failure under law. The books of the law, as in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers were rather an abstract system of types, only in part reduced to practice, with the facts even selected as types also. Hence in Deuteronomy the typical institution has no practical character as compared with those elsewhere. And, as has been remarked, it, is the book, and the only one, which our Lord quoted in reply to Satan's temptation. So also it is the book which the apostle applied. to the righteousness of faith in the gospel as contrasted with that of the law. All this, and a great deal more of spiritual interest, contribute to pour scorn on the scorners who vie with one another in striving to make it out a forgery or religious romance composed not earlier than in the days of Josiah. Inspiration accounts for its salient properties, as it does for each of the books that preceded, all written by Moses, but in a wisdom of the Spirit beyond his who was the instrument of the Holy Spirit.