August 21

PART III.—1 Corinthians 5:7.

AFTER the Paschal Lamb was slain, it was to be roasted with fire; and, in effecting this, it was fixed upon a transverse instrument, which was a very striking representation of the cross, on which the Lamb of God offered himself as a sacrifice for sin. And the fire itself seems to have been designed to denote the intensity of those agonies which Jesus was called upon to endure on our behalf. Yes, it behoved the fire of Divine Justice to descend and consume this sacrifice, that our redemption might be efficiently and eternally accomplished. Of the Paschal Lamb not a bone was to be broken. How very wonderfully this was realized in Christ. The legs of the two male-factors who were crucified with our Lord were broken, but not a bone of Jesus, our true Paschal Lamb, was injured. Again, the flesh of the Paschal Lamb was to be eaten. So Jesus came, that we might eat his flesh and drink his blood, and thus partake of everlasting life. On him the soul is to feed; he is the true staff of the soul's existence, -- the only bread of life, which hath come down from heaven. The Paschal Lamb was to be eaten by Israelites only, with unleavened bread and with bitter herbs. Christ is available to believers only.

We cannot receive him but by faith, and we cannot enjoy him unless our souls are sincere before him, and our hearts are delivered from the leaven of deceit and hypocrisy. In receiving Christ, too, there will be the manifestation of genuine contrition for sin—the bitter herbs of that godly sorrow which worketh repentance unto life. The blood of the Paschal Lamb was to be sprinkled on the door-posts of their dwellings. So the blood of Jesus must cleanse us from an evil conscience, by being sprinkled upon our hearts; and thus only are we sanctified to God, and made kings and priests, unto God and the Lamb. The happy result was, that all such were preserved from the angel of destruction, and participated in the deliverance which God had provided for his people. And all who thus come to the experimental application of the blood of Jesus are delivered from present condemnation, have peace with God, and shall finally obtain everlasting life.

"Then let us sit beneath his cross, And gladly catch the healing stream, All things for him account but loss, And give up all our hearts to him: Of nothing speak or think beside, My Lord, my Love, is crucified."