HOW CHRIST BORE OUR SINS.
By Mrs. S. N. Haskell
Throughout the countless ages of eternity we shall ever have reason to praise and magnify our Saviour, because he bore our sins. When the solemn scenes of the judgment close in the heavenly sanctuary, the sins Christ has carried will be laid upon the head of the originator of evil, and sin will be forever destroyed. “Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree.” 1 Peter 2:24. When the Saviour hung upon the cross, where were our sins?—“In his own body.” He was the spotless Son of God, his character was without the least taint of sin; yet we read, “He bare our sins in his own body on the tree.” In the typical service, when an offering was brought, it was to be without blemish, representing the spotless Son of God. When the lamb was brought to the door of the sanctuary, the sinner laid his hand upon the head of the lamb, and confessed his sins over the lamb. In type that innocent lamb became sin, and was slain; for “the wages of sin is death.” The priest, typifying Christ, met the sinner, and took a portion of that lamb into the sanctuary, thus transferring the sin from the person to the sanctuary. Lev. 10:16–18; 6:30. The sinner went free; for the great Sin-bearer, in type, had met him, taken the sin, and carried it in his own person. When the priest did not bear the blood into the sanctuary, he ate a portion of the flesh, which represented sin, thus showing in type and shadow how the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world, would meet every repentant sinner, take his sin, and bear it himself. When the sin was confessed, it was then, typically, transferred to the lamb. So Christ, the Lamb of God, was slain from the foundation of the world, and every repentant sinner, from Adam down, has cast his sins upon that pure Lamb of God. The time is near at hand when the Saviour will cease to bear the sins, but will lay them upon Satan, and eternally destroy both, and come to the earth without sin, to gather his waiting ones to himself. Then he will “change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body.” “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed.”