The Gospel in Leviticus by Henry Law

Author:Henry Law [Law, Henry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Religion
Publisher: Jazzybee Verlag
Published: 2018-01-17T23:00:00+00:00

HOLY BLOOD

"And I will turn against anyone, whether an Israelite or a foreigner living among you, who eats or drinks blood in any form. I will cut off such a person from the community, for the life of any creature is in its blood. I have given you the blood so you can make atonement for your sins. It is the blood, representing life, that brings you atonement." Leviticus 17:10-11

How solemn is this ordinance's voice! It speaks a stern command. It sets a rigid fence around all blood. No common use may touch. No lips may taste. It is laid up among God's holiest things. All reverence enshrines it. A dreadful sanctity excepts it from the food of man.

My soul, this is a consecrated spot. Approach it meekly and in prayer.

What, if offence occur? What, if the appetite profanely take? What, if rash hands shall bring it to the table? Then penalty frowns terribly. God's smile withdraws. His favor ceases. Wrath darkens. Excluding judgments follow. The rebel is cut off from among the people.

My soul, terrors frequent this spot. Approach it meekly and in prayer.

But why is blood thus sanctified? No slight design can frame a law so strict. There must be significance—wise as the author—great as the originating mind. It is so. For is not blood the Altar's food? Yes. There is its constant flow. It is the stream from the expiring victim. Blood reminds of death, as the desert of sin; and it bears witness, that remission is prepared. Thus it is linked with expiating grace. No eye should see it, without thought of the tremendous curse, and of a substituted sufferer.

Blood then is holy, because it points to Calvary's cross. Its instant language proclaims Christ. It shadows forth the wrath-sustaining death of God's co-equal Son. It introduces Jesus bleeding, that souls may live. Blood is full symbol of the redemption's price. It is clear emblem of the one atoning Lamb.

Thus the grand significance of its holiness appears. When an enlarged decree gave animals for food, the prohibition was annexed, "But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it." Genesis 9:4. So soon as meat was granted for the table, this sign of expiation (the blood) was reserved. From age to age, until the expected Jesus came, the same forbidding voice was heard, 'Touch not, taste not, the blood. It is devoted unto God. It is most holy unto Him. It pictures out redeeming suffering. It is atonement for the soul.'

Reader, the elders of faith's family were thus constrained to note this mark. No day could pass without remembrance of its hallowed end. We live in Gospel-day. The wondrous death is no more veiled in mystic types. We gaze with open eye upon the blood-stained cross. We can approach the fountain opened in a Savior's side. We may sit down beneath the trickling drops. We may there wash our every sin away. Shall we, thus privileged, fall short in reverence? Forbid it faith, forbid it love, forbid it every throb of every new-born heart.

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