This system seeks a symbolic representation in these bloody sacrifices. The offerer brings forward his lamb of the flock; he lays his hand upon that innocent head and confesses there his sin: he in a sort transfers hisown personality—or more precisely, his own sin and guilt, to that animal victim; he stands by and witnesses the death-scene with a deepened sense that he deserves a death far worse than that himself. But when the fires from heaven descend and consume his offering, and he finds himself not only spared but blessed of God and bidden to go in peace, he gets a sense unknown before, of the peace and joy of pardoned sin. The blood sprinkled upon and around the altar and toward the most holy place and upon himself becomes a memorial of what his salvation cost; the pardon himself receives testifies how much it is worth, “speaking better things than the blood of Abel.”
If any special argument should seem called for to prove that this is the true significance of these bloody sacrifices, we shall come to it with better preparation after the main points of the system are more fully before us.
As an illustrative system, there is yet one other point of great significance, viz. that in many of these sacrifices a portion of the animal was eaten by the offerer and by his family and friends. This great amount of animal flesh was not all consumed by the fires of the altar. Yet we are not to suppose that public economy—the saving of so much valuable human food—was the prime consideration. We must go deeper than this. Nor was it that the Lord would cultivate the social nature of his worshiping people, and therefore provided these materials for agreeable social feasting. We must go very much deeper than even this. This feasting upon the flesh of the slain animal is in germ what the gospel gives us in full development, viz. that the same Lamb of Calvary who “washed us from our sins in his own blood” “gave us his flesh to eat” as “the bread of life.” The memorial supper carries in it the same double symbol—blood and bread—the blood looking toward pardon; the bread toward sustenance for the spiritual life. So the pious Israelite might on the one hand see the blood of his sacrifice gurgling forth, caught, sprinkled toward the mercy-seat and upon his own person; and on the other hand, might take of the flesh of his slain lamb and sit down, not merely in peace but in joyful thanksgiving that death brings life—that sacrificial blood brings after it the new life of the redeemed, restored sinner, and sustenancetherefor from the very animal whose body and blood became symbols of his pardon.
Besides these sacrifices of a general character, the system provided others of a special and personal character for individuals under peculiar circumstances, e. g. for the case of vows; of purification from ceremonial uncleanness; for the restored leper, etc. Of these I need say only that they suggest the fitness of recognizing God’s hand every-where, in all possible events and under all the various dispensations of providence. These events are never barren of significance. It behooves us to study their meaning and adjust ourselves to God’s hand with resignation and with gratitude—with a sense of our unworthiness and of God’s great mercy.——The detailed methods of that ancient system have at this day no vital interest.
Scarcely of the nature of sacrifice, yet intensifying the idea of ceremonial uncleanness was the burning of the “red heifer”—the gathering up of her ashes and the preparation from them of “the water of separation”—a purification from sin in the ceremonial sense. Num. 19 gives the details, specifying the sorts of uncleanness which this purifying water washed away. The writer to the Hebrews (9: 13, 14) gave the great moral inference thus: “For if the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unto God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God”?
II. STATED TIMES AND SEASONS OF WORSHIP.
1. The Morning and Evening Sacrifice.
Two lambs of one year were offered every day; the one in the morning and the other at evening [Heb. “between the evenings”]; burnt offerings, consumed wholly upon the altar. They were accompanied with a small portion of flour, oil, and wine. This was a perpetual ordinance, never to be omitted. The original institution (Ex. 29: 38–46) is accompanied with God’s very gracious promise to meet with his people and dwellamong them, sanctifying the place of this meeting by his glory. Nothing could suggest more pertinently and tenderly that God loves to see the face of his worshiping people and to meet them as each day opens in the morning and as it closes with the setting sun. Let this communion between God and his sons and daughters never be in any wise interrupted.——The usage seems to have led pious Jews in later times to adopt these hours for their morning and evening prayer, as we may see in the case of Daniel (9: 21), and in the New Testament history.——The ritual for these sacrifices is given in detail (Num. 28: 3–8).
2. The Sacrifices for the Sabbath.