The same principle of substitution appears in the redemption of the first-born sons. But there is a marked difference between that made for them, and that for the animals, viz., that the law did not admit the idea of any such thing as human sacrifice, and therefore the sons were not like the animals subject to death. They belonged to God for service, not for death, and the redemption price was of the same character as the yoke from which they were redeemed. Thus you find the whole tribe of Levi given up as the redemption price of the first-born of the other tribes. The transaction is explained, Num. iii. 41. ‘Thou shalt take the Levites for me (I am the Lord) instead of all the first-born among the children of Israel.’ Thus all the men amongst the Levites were numbered, and all the first-born amongst the other tribes, and by divine authority the Levites were solemnly given up as a substitute for the others, Num. iii 45: ‘Take the Levites instead of all the first-born among the children of Israel, and the cattle of the Levites instead of their cattle: and the Levites shall be mine: I am the Lord.’
But here a difficulty arose, and it is one which teaches us the extreme danger of giving a typical authority to all the institutions of the Old Testament. There was clearly in this case the principle of substitution. The Levites were substituted for the first-born, and the first-born were free. The transaction was, therefore, an illustration of the work of the atonement. But yet if we were to regard it as a divine type of it we should be landed in a most dangerous and unscriptural conclusion, for in the case of the first-born the substituted gift was insufficient; so that if we were to call those Levites a type of the Lord Jesus, we might gather that His sacrifice was insufficient, and required something else as a supplement. Be very careful, therefore, how you call anything a type which is not declared to be one by God Himself.
When the Levites were numbered it turned out that there were only 22,000; but the number of the first-born males of the other tribes was 22,273. The substitution, therefore, fell short by 273 persons. It clearly, therefore, could be no type of the Lord Jesus, for there was no falling short in Him. The result was that a supplement was necessary. Five shekels of silver was to be added for each of the 273, and when that was paid the whole of the first-born were redeemed. This money payment afterwards became a permanent institution in Israel, and appears to have been continued long after the original transaction was complete. In Num. xviii. 16, we find the direction that ‘all that are to be redeemed . . . shalt thou redeem . . . for the money of five shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary.’
Now in this Levitical picture there are many things that bear a close resemblance to the Gospel. There was a clear legal claim, and the remission of that claim by substitution, or the payment of a redemption price. And this may serve to illustrate the claim which the law has on us all, and the remission of the claim by the substitution of the Son of God. But, as I have already said, we must be very careful how we call it a type, for the contrasts are more remarkable than the resemblances. There are two points of contrast to which I would draw your most especial attention, points which I can scarcely doubt you have yourselves observed already.
In the first place, the freedom or the release bestowed on the first-born through redemption was the exact opposite of that bestowed on us through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. They were redeemed from God; but we are redeemed to God, as we read Rev. v. 9, ‘Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation.’ Before they were redeemed, all the first-born were the Lord’s, and were enrolled as a separate people belonging in a special and peculiar manner to Him; so that He said of them, Num. iii. 13, ‘All the first-born are mine.’ The effect of the redemption was to put an end to this sacred relationship, and to place them on the same footing as the other members of the family. It released them from all that was involved in their being a peculiar people unto God. They ceased, in short, to be a peculiar people. Now this is the exact reverse of the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. The effect of His work is to call out a peculiar people unto God, and so separate us unto Himself, that He may say of us, as He said of the first-born, ‘All are mine.’ You remember how clearly this is put in Titus, ii. 14, ‘Who gave himself for us.’ There is the redemption price, and the next clause teaches the object of it, ‘that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.’ Those, therefore, whom he has redeemed are purified as ‘a peculiar people unto himself.’ We are brought by redemption into the position from which the first-born were delivered. And I cannot help thinking that there is an allusion to this fact in that great description of the Christian’s position in Heb xii. We there read, in ver. 23, that we are come ‘to the general assembly and church of the first-born which are written in heaven.’ What is the meaning of that expression? Why are believers called the first-born, and why were their names thus written? Is it not because they are brought into the same peculiar relationship to God which was the inheritance of the first-born? Because, as the first-born were His own so are we? And because as they were enrolled as being His in the national register, so are we in the book of life? And is there any one amongst us that would wish to be free from that peculiarity? Is there one that has ever knelt down in the fulness of his heart and said, ‘Lord, I am thine,’ who would now rise up and say, ‘But I wish to be thine no more’? Is there any one who has ever borne the yoke of the Lord Jesus who would now wish to throw it off, and be free? No, never! We wish to be free from all that keeps us back from Him; free from every weight and from the sin which doth so easily beset us: free from every temptation that tends to hinder us in His service. But free from Christ! Never, never, never! The desire of our heart is to be His altogether; His without reserve; His in the exercise of all our powers; His in life; His in death; His for eternity; His whatever may be given up for His service; His, so completely, so truly, so heartily, that we may be able to say in the sincerity of our souls, ‘Whether we live, we live unto the Lord, and whether we die, we die unto the Lord; whether we live, therefore, or die, we are the Lord’s.’
But there is another most marked point of contrast to which I have already alluded, but which we ought to consider more carefully before we close. There was an essential difference of character between the redemption price in the case of the first-born and in ours. In theirs there was no shedding of blood. There was substitution, but not blood-shedding. The life of the child was not forfeited to the law, so the life of the substitute was not taken in its stead. It was a gift of service for service, the service of the Levite for the service of the child. Then again it was a mixed, and composite substitution. The substitution of the Levites was insufficient, so the defect was made up by the 1365 shekels of silver. But in our case, as our lives were forfeited by sin, His life was given in our stead; and who shall say that it was insufficient? May we not rather say, ‘She hath received at the Lord’s hand double for all her sins,’ for ‘with Him is plenteous redemption?’ We have no need to supplement His sacrifices by silver. It appears that St. Peter had reference to this very contrast and to those supplemented shekels, when he said, 1 Pet. i. 18, ‘Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers: but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.’ Some people might possibly think more of redemption if the redemption price consisted of gold and silver, for they seem to care more for money than for the most precious blood of Christ; at all events, they appear to cling much faster to it. But what can money do for you when you are face to face with God? And what can man do for you when your conscience is bowed down by the weight of sin? No vicarious work of other men, and no gifts, however great, can set you free from the yoke and condemnation of the law. That will never enable you to say, as was said to me last week by one well known to many of you, ‘The whole weight is gone.’ No, indeed! All the Levitical service that conscientious men may offer to God, and all the accumulated wealth that the richest amongst us may tender as a redemption price, will all together utterly fail to take the weight from one sin-burdened soul. But the precious blood of Christ, of Christ Jesus the one divinely-appointed substitute, that is enough; enough, though quite alone, enough to redeem us from the whole curse, and to redeem us from it for ever, that so, by His boundless grace, we may be set apart as the first-born unto God, and live and die amongst those who are written in heaven.
IV. THE BONDSMAN.
‘After that he is sold he may be redeemed again; one of his brethren may redeem him.’—Lev. xxv. 48.
Our blessed Lord said in the Sermon on the Mount, ‘Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.’ He did not come as a sweeping reformer to break down existing institutions, and sweep away the law of types; but He did come as the predicted Messiah, to fulfil the prophecies of those prophetic pictures, and to give a fresh dignity to the law in which they were embodied. In no instance, therefore, do you find Him violating the law. He swept away with a strong hand the vain traditions which men had added to it; but the law itself he always honoured, and His great complaint against the advocates of tradition was, ‘Ye do make void the commandments of the law by your traditions.’
But it was not only in the practical details of life that He honoured the law, but in the whole great work of redemption. Every part of that wonderful work was an act of homage to the law. Not only did He obey it when He was come, but in the act of coming, or in other words, even in His incarnation, He showed His obedience.