That the awful terrors connected with the giving of the law should be immediately followed by two enactments which beautifully and significantly bring before us the person and work of the Lord Jesus, and God's grace by Him, is like an evening rainbow after the thunder, lightning, and storm of a summer's day.
“An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee and bless thee” (Exodus 20:24). That the law could never bring, for “cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.” But the altar here prescribed with its offerings gave a means of approach to God in which the comer would be blest. Anything that would savor of man-his tool on stones, or steps by which he might carry himself up-would only work pollution, and discover man's absolute nakedness or want of resource.
In Psalm 84 we have the utterance of a heart that delights in the tabernacles of Jehovah of hosts, that would be, not in spirit only but, in heart and body there, which is what we are to understand from the words, “My heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God.” And he is jealous of the birds that find a resting place in such courts. But what must be the ground on which I can be there? The answer is, “Thine altars, O Jehovah of hosts, my King and my God” (verse 3). Well will it be for Israel in that day when they seek no longer to a law that can only condemn! and their petition shall be, “Behold, O God, our shield, and look upon the face of thine anointed” (ver. 9). One can understand how a brief day spent “in thy courts is better than a thousand” passed elsewhere. Do we long, beloved, to be in the place where, as He says, “I record my name”? “For where two or three are gathered together to my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20), or, are our hearts cold about it? Oh! that we might gather up somewhat of the Psalmist's warmth in this matter! For “we have an altar whereof they have no right to eat that serve the tabernacle” and a righteous title of entrance within the veil is ours because “Jesus also that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate.” Yes, called as we are to go forth to Him without the camp, bearing His reproach, we have, on the other hand, boldness to enter into the holiest, by the blood of Jesus, who so suffered for us. May we be stirred up, therefore, having a great priest over the house of God, to draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water” (Hebrews 10:22). “By him, therefore, let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips, confessing (margin) to his name” (Hebrews 13:15).
In the Hebrew servant of Exodus 21, how blessedly we see Him who is “My servant, mine elect in whom my soul delighteth” (Isaiah 42)! Assuredly, He is the one who distinctly said, “I love my master,” for is not this (we say it reverently) the Master's account of Him, “Who took upon him the form of a servant,” who “became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross"? He, by that death, glorified God (and how fitting that God should always have the first place!), and met, too, the need of the wife and the children, for whose sake He would not go out free. It is good to trace this Hebrew servant who did “not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street,” who never asserted His rights, yet He is the One whom Jehovah has given, not only to be “a covenant of the people,” but “for a light to the Gentiles,” “to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house.” He alone can do it, and will do it unaided. And surely the seal is set to that in this that follows: “I am Jehovah; that is my name, and my glory will I not give to another.”
View again the servant “in whom I will be glorified” in Isaiah 49. Apparently, as regards Jacob and Israel, He has spent His strength for naught and in vain, but “though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of Jehovah.” Truly He is. For “God also hath highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name: that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippians 2:9-11). Thank God for this, and for what Isaiah adds, “It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth” (49:6). And so the Perfect Servant's commission, when He had died and risen again, was, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned” (Mark 16:15, 16). And how fitting that He, “Jesus Christ the Son of God” (Mark 1:1), this wondrous Servant, should have it recorded of Him in the concluding chapter of this Gospel, “So then, after the Lord had spoken unto them, He was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God!” And our hearts would have it so indeed, for He is worthy.
W. N. T,