Many souls believe God's word, and the great fundamental truths of the gospel, and yet have not peace with God. The reason of this is that there is a want of intelligent application of the truth known to the soul's need, according to the details given of God in His word for the very purpose of making His grace fully known and enjoyed. "The obedience of faith" is in measure lacking, and " the pure milk of the word is not what the heart drinks into. Thoughts, feelings, and actions that flow from our own poor dark hearts are substituted, under Satan's skillful tuition, for those "words" of the living God the entrance of which, "giveth light; and giveth understanding to the simple."
Peace with God, in view of judgment to come, there cannot be until the soul rests simply, and fully on the blood of Christ. Two things enter into this peace. The blood itself, and the way in which the soul appropriates its value. It is the latter of these that the verse quoted above brings before us.
Attention to the details given in the type, and applied by faith, cannot fail, where the blood of Christ is really looked to, to give peace. The Lord by His Spirit enables us to look simply at these.
For a moment let us take note of the verse that precedes, and the one that succeeds. the verse that engages us. In the one, the slain lamb, with its poured out blood in the basin ready for application, is before the eye. Just that which happened at the cross eighteen hundred years ago-" The Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world" with the shed blood. In the other, the judgment impending over the scene in which the Israelite lived, is presented as about to break forth. Vivid forecasting of the world in which the sinner now lives with " the wrath to come" ready to be revealed from Heaven.
As the Israelite stood between the basin of blood on the one hand, and the sword of the destroying angel on the other, so the sinner stands now between the cross on the one hand, and the coming wrath of God on the other. Safety then, as now, depending upon the "obedience of faith" in the use of the provision that grace has provided as the only means of escape from the impending storm; while peace of heart, as looking on to the day of judgment, is alone to be known in the consciousness that the conditions of application have been observed in all their exactitude.
Let us carefully note that with providing the means of salvation the Israelite had nothing to do. Jehovah who announced the coming judgment, and who, as the One that would execute that judgment, alone knew what would be required to save from it, both planned and provided the means of escape, and all the Israelite, who believed the judgment would come, had to do, was to avail himself of the blood in the basin. So to speak, the blood was Jehovah's work for him, using the blood was his own 'work, by which he personally appropriated the value of the blood, and became sheltered by it from the sword of the destroying angel. The provision was there utterly apart from, and outside himself, as the sovereign act of Jehovah's love to him, and all he could do was to slight that love, neglect to avail himself of it, and thus be lost through unbelief.
In the same way the blood of the cross of Christ is the sovereign act of divine love in providing a means of escape from eternal judgment for any and all sinners who will avail themselves, as believing in that judgment, of its blessed shelter. "God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have eternal life," consequently the gospel goes out "into all the world and to every creature," and " He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."
The Cross, with the shed blood of the Lamb "foreordained before the foundation of the world," is the standing proof of God's love to men, to all men, and where the testimony to that blood has gone, it is simply a question of rejecting or receiving the value of that blood as God's exclusive means of salvation from wrath to come. Before all men God". sets forth Jesus a propitiation through faith in His blood," and in this way becomes "the just and justifier of him that believeth in Jesus." Thus the great consideration for every soul should be, am I sheltered beneath that blood, so that God Himself, who is the judge, has become my justifier?
As the believing Israelite dipped the piece of hyssop, emblem of repentance or of his judgment of himself as a sinner, in the basin, and carefully struck with blood the lintel and the two side posts of his dwelling, thus covering himself completely in with blood, and abode within his blood bought place of safety till the morning, when the judgment was completely past; so the believing and repentant sinner now covers himself completely with the blood of Jesus in his conscience, and, as a question of salvation from judgment to come, in spirit abides beneath the shelter of the blood of the Lamb until the morning of resurrection and the "wrath to come" is forever past.
Peacefully reposing within his blood-sprinkled dwelling, knowing the sword of the destroying angel could not possibly reach him, the Israelite eat the paschal supper, feasted upon the body of the lamb whose substitutional death had saved him from death, of which the blood on the lintel and two side posts was the token to himself, as well as to the angel, but it added nothing to his security. It fed his heart with sweet memories of the victim's death, deepened the peace he already enjoyed, and strengthened him for the journey across the desert to the promised land, but the destroying angel saw nothing of this, it was not the state of the Israelite inside the house that covered him, he saw the blood on the outside, and he passed by, passed by forever; his sword could have no mission where that blood was. The blood sprinkled lintel settled everything, and he had no further inquiry to make. Come he from above, the blood met him; did he seek to enter by the right, the blood stopped him, or happened he in his destroying pathway tote coming by the left, the blood turned him aside, for he was simply doing the bidding of Him who had said, "when I see the blood I will pass over."
The Israelite might go on his journey, and experience the deliverance of Jehovah from the power of the enemy at the Red Sea, sing songs of triumph on the other side; he might wearisomely travel across the desert, keep and re-keep the paschal supper, pass through many experiences of mercy and of government, and finally pass the Jordan, by Jehovah's strong arm sustained, and find every promise, that had sustained the heart by the way, fulfilled, but sprinkle the lintel he never did again, the God of judgment had once been met, and met forever by the blood, the value and virtue of which never changed.
So is it with the believer now, sprinkled once with the blood of Christ, he is sprinkled forever, and there the conscience divinely taught, rests in peace with God, "justified by His blood," and can always say "in whom we have redemption through His blood the forgiveness of sins."
He may take constantly the Lord's supper, pass through many experiences, learn many blessed truths, and finally find himself in glory with Christ, but he knows he is saved from all the wrath to come by the blood of Christ. For him Christ has already met the God of judgment. He has died for him, and that precious blood which at the first he so carefully sprinkled, so to speak, on the lintel and two side posts, abides ever in his conscience as " the token " of his security.
The grace of God is not according to my needs, but beyond them.