A Study of the Sanctuary
By E. E. Andross
Illustrated in Abel and His Offering WHEN announcing to the shepherds the birth of Jesus, “the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.” Luke 2: 9-11. This announcement contained the germ of the gospel which, in the life and death, the resurrection and intercessory work of the Saviour, developed into the fulness of the glorious gospel of the blessed God. The gospel is bound up in one word as revealed by the angel to Joseph when he said, “Thou shalt call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people from their sins.” Matt. 1: 21. “The wages of sin is death.” “When lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.” “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” Rom. 6: 23; James 1: 15; Rom. 5: 12. From the above scriptures it is clear that death came into the world by sin; that sin is the primal cause of death; and that death can not be removed except by the removal of sin. It was for this purpose that Christ came into the world. “Now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” Heb. 9: 26. “Whosoever committeth sin,” declares the apostle John, “transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.” 1 John 3: 4. The law which man transgressed being in its very nature eternal, immutable, unchangeable, demanded the life of the transgressor; it could not be violated with impunity; hence, except One equal with the law should take upon Himself the wages of sin, should Himself suffer death in the place of the transgressor, man must inevitably perish. When Adam and Eve awoke to the consciousness of the terrible nature of their sin, and to the awful consequences that must follow, before they left the Garden of Eden the clouds parted and a ray of light penetrated the gloom that had gathered about the souls of the once holy, happy pair. In the sentence pronounced upon their enemy, “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her Seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise His heel,” they saw the promise of a Deliverer, and of the ultimate triumph of righteousness. God revealed to them what redemption would cost in the humiliation, the sufferings and death of His beloved Son. The entire ritual of the sacrificial system was “ordained by God to be to man a perpetual reminder and a penitential acknowledgment of his sin, and a profession of his faith in the promised Redeemer.” It was “intended to impress upon the fallen race the solemn truth that death is the result of sin, the transgression of the law of God.” From the gates of Paradise to Calvary, the types and shadows of the patriarchal and Jewish ages pointed forward to the one all-sufficient offering on the cross. Another has truly said, “Christ was the foundation of the Jewish economy. The whole system of types and symbols was a compacted prophecy of the gospel, a presentation in which were bound up the promises of redemption.” “By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.” Heb. 11: 4. “Abel was a keeper of sheep,” and “brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering.” Abel realized that he had sinned, and that his sin stood between himself and God. The prophet Isaiah says: “Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that He will not hear.” Isa. 59: 2. Abel heard the voice of God speaking unto him saying, “Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.” Isa. 45: 22. In his dying victim, by faith he beheld “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” The lamb which he brought was sinless, but over its head the sin of the transgressor was confessed, and the innocent lamb died in the place of the guilty sinner. In the blood flowing from the wound which his own hand had inflicted Abel saw a representation of the blood of the Son of God, which, when the fulness of time should come, would flow from wounds which his sins would help to inflict and which would actually cleanse his soul from its guilty stain. While it is not possible that the blood of animals should take away sin, the sacrificial victims did serve as a most appropriate means of expressing the faith of the truly penitent in the new covenant to be sealed by the death of the Son of God. The truth uttered four thousand years after the fall, the fundamental truth enunciated by Peter was just as vital at the cherubim-guarded gate of Paradise, and all through the succeeding ages to the cross, as when before the high priest at Jerusalem, filled with the Holy Ghost, he declared, “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” A type is a visible representation of a future truth. The sacrificial offerings of the old dispensation were designed to serve this very purpose, and through them the “holy men of old” looked forward to the cross of Calvary. Through the faith thus expressed they obtained witness that they were righteous, and we are compelled to acknowledge with profound admiration the mighty power of the all-conquering faith in the gospel manifested by that long line of ancient worthies of whom we have a brief record in Hebrews, chapter eleven. “Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Heb. 12: 1, 2. While the services of the Hebrew economy were beautiful and admirably adapted to the purpose for which they were given, we must not forget that they were the shadow while we have now reached the substance; the light which shone dimly then is shining with great brilliancy now. With the increased light comes increased responsibility. “In other ages” the gospel light “was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto His holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit.” Eph.53: 5. It is therefore unquestionably the duty of the church, and of each individual member, to gather up the rays of light reflected from the altars of the patriarchs, from the tabernacle reared at Sinai, and from the temple at Jerusalem, and with the glorious light shining directly from the cross to let the “righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth.” “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.” Isa. 62: 1; 60: 1.