Notes on the Book of Leviticus

by Charles Henry Mackintosh

Here closes the record of the Lord's dealings with the leprous man; and, oh, what a marvelous record it is! what an unfolding of the exceeding hatefulness of sin, the grace and holiness of God, the preciousness of Christ's Person, and the efficacy of His work! Nothing can be more interesting than to mark the footprints of divine grace forth from the hallowed precincts of the sanctuary to the defiled place where the leper stood, with bare head, covered lip, and rent garments. God visited the leper where he was, but He did not leave him there. He went forth prepared to accomplish a work in virtue of which He could bring the leper into a higher place and higher communion than ever he had known before. On the ground of this work, the leper was conducted from his place of defilement and loneliness to the very door of the tabernacle of the congregation, the priestly place, to enjoy priestly privileges. (Comp. Exod. xxix. 20, 21, 32.) How could he ever have climbed to such an elevation? Impossible! For aught he could do, he might have languished and died in his leprosy had not the sovereign grace of the God of Israel stooped to lift him from the dunghill, to set him among the princes of his people. If ever there was a case in which the question of human effort, human merit, and human righteousness could be fully tried and perfectly settled, the leper is unquestionably that case. Indeed it were a sad loss of time to discuss such a question in the presence of such a case. It must be obvious to the most cursory reader that naught but free grace reigning through righteousness could meet the leper's condition and the leper's need. And how gloriously and triumphantly did that grace act! It traveled down into the deepest depths, that it might raise the leper to the loftiest heights. See what the leper lost, and see what he gained! He lost all that pertained to nature, and he gained the blood of atonement and the grace of the Spirit. I mean typically. Truly he was a gainer, to an incalculable amount. He was infinitely better off than if he had never been thrust forth from the camp. Such is the grace of God! such the power and value, the virtue and efficacy, of the blood of Jesus!

How forcibly does all this remind us of the prodigal in Luke xv! In him, too, leprosy had wrought and risen to a head. He had been afar off, in the defiled place, where his own sins and the intense selfishness of the far country had created a solitude around him; but, blessed forever be a father's deep and tender love, we know how it ended. The prodigal found a higher place and tasted higher communion than ever he had known before; "the fatted calf" had never been slain for him before; "the best robe" had never been on him before. And how was this? was it a question of the prodigal's merit? Oh, no; it was simply a question of the father's love.

Dear reader, let me ask, can you ponder over the record of God's dealings with the leper in Leviticus xiv, or the father's dealings with the prodigal in Luke xv, and not have an enlarged sense of the love that dwells in the bosom of God, that flows through the Person and work of Christ, that is recorded in the Scriptures of truth, and brought home to the heart by the Holy Ghost? Lord grant us a deeper and more abiding fellowship with Himself!

From verse 21 to 32 we have "the law of him in whom is the plague of leprosy, whose hand is not able to get that which pertaineth to his cleansing." This refers to the sacrifices of "the eighth day," and not to the "two birds alive and clean." These latter could not be dispensed with in any case, because they set forth the death and resurrection of Christ as the alone ground on which God can receive a sinner back to Himself. On the other hand, the sacrifices of "the eighth day" being connected with the soul's communion, must, in some degree, be affected by the measure of the soul's apprehension; but whatever that measure may be, the grace of God can meet it with those peculiarly touching words, "such as he is able to get." And not only so, but the "two turtle-doves" conferred the same privileges on the "poor" as the two lambs conferred upon the rich, inasmuch as both the one and the other pointed to "the precious blood of Christ," which is of infinite, changeless, and eternal efficacy in the judgment of God. All stand before God on the ground of death and resurrection. All are brought into the same place of nearness, but all do not enjoy the same measure of communion—all have not the same measure of apprehension of the preciousness of Christ in all the aspects of His work. They might, if they would; but they allow themselves to be hindered in various ways. Earth and nature, with their respective influences, act prejudicially: the Spirit is grieved, and Christ is not enjoyed as He might be. It is utterly vain to expect that if we are living in the region of nature, we can be feeding upon Christ. No; there must be self-emptiness, self-denial, self-judgment, if we would habitually feed upon Christ. It is not a question of salvation; it is not a question of the leper introduced into the camp—the place of recognized relationship. By no means. It is only a question of the soul's communion, of its enjoyment of Christ. As to this, the largest measure lies open to us. We may have communion with the very highest truths; but if our measure be small, the unupbraiding grace of our Father's heart breathes in the sweet words, "such as he is able to get." The title of all is the same, however our capacity may vary; and, blessed be God, when we get into His presence, all the desires of the new nature, in their utmost intensity, are satisfied; all the powers of the new nature, in their fullest range, are occupied. May we prove these things in our soul's happy experience day by day.

We shall close this section with a brief reference to the subject of leprosy in a house.

III. The reader will observe that a case of leprosy in a person, or in a garment, might occur in the wilderness; but in the matter of a house, it was of necessity confined to the land of Canaan.

"When ye be come into the land of Canaan, which I give to you for a possession, and I put the plague of leprosy in a house of the land of your possession, ... then the priest shall command that they empty the house, before the priest go into it to see the plague, that all that is in the house be not made unclean; and afterward the priest shall go in to see the house: and he shall look on the plague, and, behold, if the plague be in the walls of the house with hollow strakes, greenish or reddish, which in sight are lower than the wall; then the priest shall go out of the house to the door of the house, and shut up the house seven days."

Looking at the house as the type of an assembly, we have some weighty principles presented to us as to the divine method of dealing with moral evil, or suspicion of evil, in a congregation. We observe the same holy calmness and perfect patience with respect to the house as we have already seen in reference to the person or the garment. There was no haste and no indifference, either as regards the house, the garment, or the individual. The man who had an interest in the house was not to treat with indifference any suspicious symptoms appearing in the wall thereof; neither was he to pronounce judgment himself upon such symptoms: it belonged to the priest to investigate and to judge. The moment that aught of a questionable nature made its appearance, the priest assumed a judicial attitude with respect to the house. The house was under judgment, though not condemned. The perfect period was to be allowed to run its course ere any decision could be arrived at. The symptoms might prove to be merely superficial, in which case there would be no demand for any action whatever.

"And the priest shall come again the seventh day, and shall look: and, behold, if the plague be spread in the walls of the house, then the priest shall command that they take away the stones in which the plague is, and they shall cast them into an unclean place without the city." The whole house was not to be condemned: the removal of the leprous stones was first to be tried.

"And if the plague come again, and break out in the house, after that he hath taken away the stones, and after that he hath scraped the house, and after that it is plastered; then the priest shall come and look, and, behold, if the plague be spread in the house, it is a fretting leprosy in the house: it is unclean. And he shall break down the house, the stones of it, and the timber thereof, and all the mortar of the house; and he shall carry them forth out of the city into an unclean place." The case was hopeless, the evil irremediable, the whole building was annihilated.