Works of John Bunyan — Complete

by John Bunyan

The meat was of two sorts, roast or boiled. Of that which was roasted was the passover, and of that which was boiled were the trespass-offerings. Wherefore, concerning the passover, he saith, 'Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his head with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof' (Exo 12:9). This roast meat was a type of the body of Christ as suffering for our sins, the which, when it was roast, was, and is as dressed up in chargers, and set before the congregations of the saints.

But what were the chargers a type of? I also ask, in what charger our gospel passover is now dressed up and set before the people? Is it not in the four evangelists, the prophets, and epistles of the apostles? They therefore are the chargers and the ordinance of the supper; in these also are the trespass-offerings, with what is fried in pans, mystically prepared for the children of the Highest.

And why might they not be a type of gospel sermons?

I answer, I think not so fitly; for, alas! the best of sermons in the world are but as thin slices cut out of those large dishes. Our ministers are the carvers, good doctrine is the meat, and the charger in which this meat is found are the holy canonical Scriptures, &c., though, as I said, most properly the New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

In these is Christ most truly, lively, and amply set before us as crucified, or roasted at the fire of God's law for our sins, that we might live by him through faith, feeding upon him (2 Cor 3:12; Gal 3:12; Acts 3:18-22, 13:2-5, 26:22; 1 Peter 1:10; Acts 7:52, 15:15, 28:23; Rom 16:26; Rev 10:7).

There is in these chargers not only meat, but sauce, if you like it, to eat the meat withal; for the passover there are bitter herbs, or sound repentance; and for other, as the thank-offerings, their is holy cheerfulness and prayers to God for grace. All these are set forth before in the holy Scriptures, and presented to us thereby, as in the gold chargers of the temple. He that will scoff at this, let him scoff. The chargers were a type of something; and he that can show a fitter antitype than is here proposed to consideration, let him do it, and I will be thankful to him.

Christians, here is your meat before you, and get your carvers to slice it out for you, and this know, the deeper you dip it in the sauce, the better it will relish. But let not unbelief teach you such manners as to make you leave the best bits behind you. For your liberty is to eat freely of the best, of the fat, and of the sweet.

LIII. Of the goings out of the Temple.

As to the comings into the temple, of them we have spoken already; namely, of the outer and inner court, as also of the doors of the porch and temple. The coming in was but one strait course, and that a type of Jesus Christ; but the goings out were many (John 10:9, 14:6).

Now, as I said, it is insinuated that the goings out are many, answerable to the many ways which the children of men have invented to apostatize in from God. Christ is the way into; but sin the way out of the temple of God. True, I read not of a description of the goings out of this house, as I read of the comings in. Only when they had Athaliah out thence, she is said to go out by the way by which the horses come into the king's stables, and there she was slain, as it were upon the horse dung-hill (2 Kings 11:16; 2 Chron 23:15). When Uzziah also went out of this house for his transgression, he was cast out of all society, and made to dwell in a kind of a pest-house, even to the day of his death (2 Chron 26:21).