Notes on the book of Exodus

by Charles Henry Mackintosh

Such is the plain doctrine of the Word in reference to the momentous questions of condition and nature. But on what is all this founded? How is the believer introduced into a condition of divine righteousness and made partaker of the divine nature? It all rests on the great truth that "JESUS DIED AND ROSE AGAIN." That blessed One left the bosom of eternal love, the throne of glory, the mansions of unfading light; came down into this world of guilt and woe; took upon Him the likeness of sinful flesh; and, having perfectly exhibited and perfectly glorified God in all the movements of His blessed life here below, He died upon the cross, under the full weight of His people's transgressions. By so doing, He divinely met all that was or could be against us. He magnified the law and made it honorable; and, having done so, He became a curse by hanging on the tree. Every claim was met, every enemy silenced, every obstacle removed. "Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other." Infinite justice was satisfied, and infinite love can flow, in all its soothing and refreshing virtues, into the broken heart of the sinner; while, at the same time, the cleansing and atoning stream that flowed from the pierced side of a crucified Christ, perfectly meets all the cravings of a guilty and convicted conscience. The Lord Jesus, on the cross, stood in our place. He was our representative. He died, "the just for the unjust." "He was made sin for us." (2 Cor. v. 21; 1 Peter iii. 18.) He died the sinner's death, was buried, and rose again, having accomplished all. Hence, there is absolutely nothing against the believer. He is linked with Christ, and stands in the same condition of righteousness. "As He is, so are we in this world." (1 John iv. 17.)

This gives settled peace to the conscience. If I am no longer in a condition of guilt, but in a condition of justification,—if God only sees me in Christ and as Christ, then, clearly, my portion is perfect peace. "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." (Rom. v. 1.) The blood of the Lamb has canceled all the believer's guilt,—blotted out his heavy debt, and given him a perfectly blank page, in the presence of that holiness which "cannot look upon sin."

But the believer has not merely found peace with God; he is made a child of God, so that he can taste the sweetness of communion with the Father and the Son, through the power of the Holy Ghost. The cross is to be viewed in two ways: first, as satisfying God's claims; secondly, as expressing God's affections. If I look at my sins in connection with the claims of God as a Judge, I find, in the cross, a perfect settlement of those claims. God, as a Judge, has been divinely satisfied—yea, glorified, in the cross. But there is more than this. God had affections as well as claims; and, in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, all those affections are sweetly and touchingly told out into the sinner's ear; while, at the same time, he is made partaker of a new nature which is capable of enjoying those affections and having fellowship with the heart from which they flow. "For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God." (1 Peter iii. 18.) Thus, we are not only brought into a condition, but unto a Person, even God Himself, and we are endowed with a nature which can delight in Him.—"We also joy in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the reconciliation (margin)." (Rom. v. 11.)

What force and beauty, therefore, can we see in those emancipating words, "Let My people go, that they may hold a feast unto Me in the wilderness." "The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He hath anointed Me to preach the gospel; He hath sent Me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised." (Luke iv. 18.) The glad tidings of the gospel announce full deliverance from every yoke of bondage. Peace and liberty are the boons which that gospel bestows on all who believe it, as God has declared it.

And mark, it is "that they may hold a feast to Me." If they were to get done with Pharaoh, it was that they might begin with God. This was a great change. Instead of toiling under Pharaoh's taskmasters, they were to feast in company with Jehovah; and, although they were to pass from Egypt into the wilderness, still the divine presence was to accompany them; and if the wilderness was rough and dreary, it was the way to the land of Canaan. The divine purpose was, that they should hold a feast unto the Lord in the wilderness, and in order to do this, they should be "let go" out of Egypt.

However, Pharaoh was in no wise disposed to yield obedience to the divine mandate. "Who is the Lord," said he, "that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I know not the Lord, neither will I let Israel go." (Chap. v. 2.) Pharaoh most truly expressed, in these words, his real condition. His condition was one of ignorance and consequent disobedience. Both go together. If God be not known, He cannot be obeyed; for obedience is ever founded upon knowledge. When the soul is blessed with the knowledge of God, it finds this knowledge to be life (John xvii. 3.), and life is power; and when I get power, I can act. It is obvious that one cannot act without life; and therefore it is most unintelligent to set people upon doing certain things in order to get that by which alone they can do anything.

But Pharaoh was as ignorant of himself as he was of the Lord. He did not know that he was a poor, vile worm of the earth, and that he had been raised up for the express purpose of making known the glory of the very One whom he said he knew not. (Exod. ix. 16; Rom. ix. 17.) "And they said, 'The God of the Hebrews has met with us: let us go, we pray thee, three days' journey into the desert, and sacrifice unto the Lord our God; lest He fall upon us with pestilence or with the sword.' And the king of Egypt said unto them, 'Wherefore do ye, Moses and Aaron, let the people from their work? Get you unto your burdens ... let there more work be laid upon the men, that they may labor therein; and let them not regard vain words.'" (Ver. 3-9.)

What a development of the secret springs of the human heart we have here! What complete incompetency to enter into the things of God! All the divine titles and the divine revelations were, in Pharaoh's estimation, "vain words." What did he know or care about "three days' journey into the wilderness," or "a feast to Jehovah"? How could he understand the need of such a journey, or the nature or object of such a feast? Impossible. He could understand burden-bearing and brick-making; these things had an air of reality about them, in his judgment; but as to aught of God, His service, or His worship, he could only regard it in the light of an idle chimera, devised by those who only wanted an excuse to make their escape from the stern realities of actual life.

Thus has it too often been with the wise and great of this world. They have ever been the most forward to write folly and vanity upon the divine testimonies. Hearken, for example, to the estimate which the "most noble Festus" formed of the grand question at issue between Paul and the Jews:—"They had certain questions against him of their own superstition, and of one Jesus, which was dead, whom Paul affirmed to be alive." (Acts xxv. 19.) Alas! how little he knew what he was saying! How little he knew what was involved in the question, as to whether "Jesus" was "dead" or "alive"! He thought not of the solemn bearing of that momentous question upon himself and his friends, Agrippa and Bernice; but that did not alter the matter; he and they know somewhat more about it now, though in their passing moment of earthly glory they regarded it as a superstitious question, wholly beneath the notice of men of common sense, and only fit to occupy the disordered brain of visionary enthusiasts. Yes; the stupendous question which fixes the destiny of every child of Adam—on which is founded the present and everlasting condition of the Church and the world—which stands connected with all the divine counsels,—this question was, in the judgment of Festus, a vain superstition.

Thus was it in Pharaoh's case. He knew nothing of "the Lord God of the Hebrews"—the great "I AM," and hence he regarded all that Moses and Aaron had said to him, in reference to doing sacrifice to God, as "vain words." The things of God must ever seem vain, profitless, and unmeaning to the unsanctified mind of man. His name may be made use of as part of the flippant phraseology of a cold and formal religiousness; but He Himself is not known. His precious name, which, to a believer's heart, has wrapped up in it all that he can possibly need or desire, has no significancy, no power, no virtue for an unbeliever. All, therefore, connected with God—His words, His counsels, His thoughts, His ways,—everything, in short, that treats of or refers to Him, is regarded as "vain words."