Sacrifices to be without blemish.
A reference to passages in the Books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, will show the frequency with which the injunction here contained was insisted upon, and the importance attached to it. Sacrifices offered to God must be without blemish. The entire Mosaic system of sacrifice was symbolic in relation to the Church that then was, and typical in relation to the Church of the future. We can scarcely miss the teaching of the enactment before us, if only we seek to interpret it with reverent and loyal hearts. Surely it taught two things in the region of law, and also two things in the sphere of grace. The former were:
1. That in the eye of the All-pure One, every moral flaw or defect was an offence, and therefore could not be accepted by him.
2. That as man was guilty before God, he could not, on the reckoning of bare law, be well-pleasing in the eyes of a righteous Being, to whom all evil was an abomination.
The latter were:
1. That a flawless sacrifice was to be selected and offered to God by, and in the name, and on the behalf of, the guilty one.
2. That such flawless sacrifice, if offered in sincerity and penitence of spirit, would be accepted on his behalf. Now, we are not left to interpret the type as best we may, nor are we called on to offer the symbolic sacrifice. The antitype has come. The reality is ours. And an inspired interpretation of ancient rites is given us by apostles and prophets of our Lord and Savior (cf. Hebrews 9:14; 1 Peter 1:19; Ephesians 5:27; 2 Peter 3:14; Jud 1:24; Revelation 14:5). With such teaching before us, we can see a sixfold significance in our text.
I. HERE IS A DIVINE APPEAL TO THE CONSCIENCE. It says, in language which ought never to be mistaken, "the least speck of sin is an offence to God;" and guilty man cannot, on the ground of his own right, have any standing-ground for an instant before him. It is said that in the later days of the Jewish economy, when the offerer brought his sacrifice, the slaughterer (who was other than the priest) took a two-edged knife and ran it from the nape of the neck down the spine, laying it bare. Not infrequently this would disclose a dark spot: this was a blemish; the animal was unfit for sacrifice, and had to be cast away. Hence the allusion in Hebrews 4:12, which, so understood, has in it marvelous power. For this blemish did not appear on the surface, it came not out to the light till the spinal marrow was exposed to view. Hence, see Hebrews 4:13, specially the marvelous phrase, " πάντα δὲ γυμνὰ καὶ τετραχηλισμένα κ. τ. λ.. Every creature is "opened" unto the eyes of him with whom is our account. And though exterior conduct may be such as to commend itself to the eye of man, yet in the "marrow" of one's being there may be a sin which is an offence to God. May be? There is. There are sins upon sins, and there is sinfulness, which is the root and ground of all. And hence it must be the case that sinful man has no right, on the ground of his own merits, to expect acceptance before God. This is the very ground-work of evangelical theology. It is said, "Pectus facit theologum," but we would say rather theolgum; for only as this appeal to (as has been remarked to us), "Conscientia facit" the conscience is felt, will the after-appeals properly tell.
II. HERE IS A DIVINE INVITATION TO FAITH. There was to be a sacrifice chosen, without blemish, which was to be presented by and on behalf of the offerer (John 1:29). God has provided a Lamb for a burnt offering, and for a sin offering too (Isaiah 53:6; 2 Corinthians 5:21). (For a discussion of the grounds on which the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once for all could be valid for the race, see Dale on the Atonement, sect. 10.) Suffice it here to say that this offering had the dignity of a Divine Sacrifice, the appropriateness of a human one, and the "sweet-smelling savor" of a perfectly pure one. Besides which it had all the spontaneity of a voluntary offering, and all the generosity of a noble serf-surrender for the sake of others; in making which the Redeemer was satisfied. And this offering which infinite love has made, loving faith may take and call its own; and abandoning all pretence to a standing-ground in native right, it may find an everlastingly firm one in sovereign grace!
III. HERE IS A DIVINE CALL TO PENITENCE. The sacrifice was to be offered with confession of sin (see Le 16:21). All the several ordinances which were spread over different sacrificial services in Israel, find their varied significances grouped in one, in the attitude of the sinner before the cross of his Savior. Well might Watts write, "My faith would lay her hand," etc. While we accept the Divine Sacrifice for sin, penitential confession over sin should ever mark us (see Psalms 51:1-19.).
IV. HERE IS A DIVINE DEMAND FOR RECTITUDE OF HEART. When we bring our offerings to the Lord, no defect should be knowingly tolerated by us. Grace gives no warrant to laxity, and true penitence will be scrupulously intolerant of it (Psalms 66:18). The freeness of pardon to the penitent involves no modification of ethical stringency, for the fact is, wherever there is any known tolerance of ill, to that extent penitence does not exist. God puts away sin by forgiving it, only as we put it away by repenting of it and casting it off.
V. HERE IS A DIVINE SUMMONS TO DEVOTION. Jesus died, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God. And where a man, sorry for sin, intolerant of the evil in his nature, struggling against it, and pleading with God to uproot it, casts himself before God in this genuine uprightness of soul, none of the imperfections over which he mourns shall prevent the Divine acceptance of such an offering, presented, as it will be, in the name of the spotless Son of God. The virtue of his spotless sacrifice ensures the acceptance of ours. Every true and sincere penitent is, on this ground of free grace and dying love, as well-pleasing to God and as near to his heart as the purest angel before the eternal throne. The offering to God of a broken and a contrite heart is one which he cannot and will not despise (see also Hebrews 13:15, Hebrews 13:16).
VI. HERE IS A DIVINE PROPHECY, TO INSPIRE HOPE. These sacrifices of ours, offered in penitence, faith, and love, are still but imperfect. And the holiest souls are most alive to such imperfection, and most sorrowful over it. Hence it should be no small joy to find in the Word of God precisely the same expressions used to express the future purity of believers that are employed to indicate the perfection of the Redeemer's sacrifice. As the one Great Sacrifice was "without blemish and without spot," so all those who are themselves living sacrifices to God, shall be "without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing." He who received them at first on the ground of his own purity, shall create in them a spotlessness like his own. They shall be "without fault" before the throne of God. And he who died for them shall then present them as his own!
Have we not here (in conclusion) a remarkable illustration of what the Apostle Paul so often speaks of as "the righteousness of God?" Each one of these six steps is a fresh aspect of it. The first shows the righteousness of God in taking cognizance of sin; the second, the righteousness of God in offering a spotless sacrifice for sin; the third, the righteousness of God in requiring penitential acknowledgment of sin; the fourth, the righteousness of God in demanding intolerance of sin; the fifth, the righteousness of God in accepting our consecration in the name of a Sinless One, only when we penitently put away sin; the sixth, the righteousness of God in ensuring that those who are living sacrifices to him shall ultimately be perfectly freed from all sin! Thus from beginning to end "grace reigns through righteousness, unto eternal life, by Jesus Christ our Lord." "Now unto him that is able to keep us from falling, and to present us faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and everse Amen."
HOMILIES BY J. ORR