The Purpose of Christ's Priesthood.
Priests are ordained for men. Heb. 5: 1. God sets value upon human souls, not as they are in the natural carnal condition, but what they are capable of becoming through grace, when upon them God stamps his own image. It is for these possibilities that Heaven has done all that has been done; Christ gave himself for this. The typical priesthood pointed forward to that of our Lord. It was all "for man." But the priesthood of Christ is not for man temporally or politically. It was not ordained to give man temporal wealth or position. The priests anciently were ordained "in the things pertaining to God," to "offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins," or, as stated in Heb. 2: 17, of our High Priest, "to make reconciliation for the sins of the people." That temporal blessings came because of this is true; but they came incidentally not objectively. "The things pertaining to God" were the object, the "all things that pertain unto life and godliness." 2 Peter 1: 3. Those who profess to be the children of God and are clamoring for earthly power or position, or seeking to accomplish great reforms by civil law, may learn a lesson from this. God's ministers in this dispensation even as in the Levitical are "ordained for man in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins of the people." Not that this is done in the same way as of old, not that the ministers make reconciliation, but they are ordained to preach the reconciliation which Christ has made, to beseech man to become reconciled to God through Christ, and then to build up by the word of God those who accept Christ. 2 Cor. 5: 11, 20; 6: 1-10. Would that the professed church of God realized this. There would not be the bickerings, janglings, and debatings over creeds. Ministers would not be found buttonholing politicians, and lobbying in our Legislatures for civil enactment to enforce church dogmas or ecclesiastical institutions. There would be no demand for Sunday laws, and no petitions to Congress to "promote" or "protect" Sunday observance. An honest searching of "the word of truth" would disclose the fact that Sunday as a sacred day is not known in Holy Scripture; that the only Sabbath is the Sabbath of the great Creator, a memorial of his creative power and a sign of redeeming love. Finding this, men could no more ask for civil enactment to compel observance of the Lord's day than they could for laws to change the heart; for only the changed heart can observe the day. To sum it all up, the evangelists, pastors, and preachers would be doing the work for which God ordained them—not clamoring for civil law, but preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ as "the power of God unto salvation," the only means of regenerating the world. The light and power of the gospel shining out from every pulpit and from the flock of God would have a restraining influence upon immorality which no civil law can have. It would be the power of God working through men. The Congregationalist complains, and it is not alone either, that professed Christians are by their influence destroying the sacredness of Sunday. Apart from the fact that Sunday never had any sacredness to lose, and that it is not in any sense the "Lord's day" more than Monday, even though called so by the Congregationalist, would it not be well to discipline and convert these professed Sunday keepers before compelling by civil law its observance by the world? Even if Sunday laws were right (which they are not), would it not be more consistent for the church to begin with itself, to let its charity in this respect begin at home, instead of prosecuting honest workingmen who are disturbing no one by Sunday labor, and who have kept the Sabbath according to the commandment? Think of this. "Sin is the transgression of the law." The root meaning of the original words in both the Old and New Testaments is "missing the mark." To sin is to miss the mark, to go astray. The character of God is the great standard. This character is expressed in God's holy law and is revealed in our Lord Jesus Christ. God's law is perfect. It embraces all righteousness; it condemns all sin; it marks out the perfect way. Any deviation from this way is sin. Whether known or unknown, it is still sin; it is missing the mark. But sins of ignorance are justified through Christ if the heart is right with God; and the heart right with God—the new heart—walks in all the light which God reveals from his word. He who knowingly transgresses God's law, "wickedly departs." He who is truly converted, who has Christ formed within, like Christ counts the keeping of God's law a delight. His language will be, "O how love I Thy law! it is my meditation all the day." Ps. 119: 97. "Make me to go in the path of Thy commandments; for therein do I delight." Ps. 119: 35.