BUT upon what principle can God forgive sins and maintain the honor of his government, and the authority of his law! This brings me to notice,
V. The great principle involved in the removal of these difficulties, i. e., the justice of God, and the honor of his moral government.
Will the Supreme Ruler of the Universe virtually abrogate his own law, and dishonor his Eternal Throne, by remitting, or even relaxing its claims, without full and perfect satisfaction, to save a rebellious and disobedient race? Such an act would destroy all confidence in the justice of the only true God, and prove to an intelligent Universe that he disregards the rectitude of his own Throne and the honor of his own government. This cannot be. The moral government of God, being founded upon his own moral character, must be as immutable and unchangeable as its own Eternal Author. For God, therefore, to dishonor his law, would be to dishonor himself; to deny its claims, a denial of himself. It must then be a plan which will be in harmony with all the attributes of God; and which will maintain all the interests of his moral government. To be such, it must be a plan that God himself shall devise; because no other being would be adequate to the task. And if it be a plan which God shall devise, it must maintain the authority of his own law, and the honor of his own government; and if he maintain the authority of his law, he must strictly enforce its penalty, either upon the guilty, or upon a substitute; and if he accept a substitute, it must be an equivalent in value to the demands of his law, and equal in dignity to the honor of his government: otherwise his moral government would suffer loss; and the rectitude of his character, as the Supreme Ruler, remain impeached to all eternity. Sooner far than this, would he spread the dark pall of eternal oblivion over this revolted world, and create a new race of obedient subjects. But, if a substitute be provided which shall meet the demands of his law, and vindicate the honor of his government, it must be one which he himself shall appoint, and, when appointed, accept; because he alone can estimate the dignity of this, or the value of that.
With these prefatory remarks, I pass to notice the Bible evidence, touching the great principle involved in removing the difficulties out of the way, so that God can be just, and yet the justifier of all those who will comply with the conditions of salvation prescribed in his word. They are removed by strictly enforcing the penalties of his law.
1. The penalty of God's law for Adamic transgression is death. Gen. ii, 17; iii, 19. This penalty Adam suffered in his own person. See Chap. v, 5. "And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died." And here the matter would doubtless have ended, had not the plan of redemption been devised, and his posterity would have suffered the penalty by their representation. But a plan for man's recovery having been devised, God gave him length of days and probation, in which, not only to prepare himself for a future life, but to generate his species, and place them in a condition whereby they might enjoy the same privileges. But his posterity must as a necessary consequence inherit the nature and condition of their father. Adam, as a matter of course, could give his offspring no better nature and condition than he himself possessed. Having incurred a mortal, dying, nature, he entailed the same nature upon his posterity. Hence according to the testimony of Paul, all die by, or as the result of, Adam's transgression. "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. v, 12. Not that all have "sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression," as this Apostle argues in verse 14; that is, by personal transgression; but by, or through, Adam, as their representative, all have sinned; and the penalty of the law for sin being death, as a necessary consequence, all must die.
Again the same Apostle says: "And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation. . . . For if by one man's offence death reigned by one. . . . Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation—For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners—That as sin hath reigned unto death," &c. Rom. v, 16-21. And again, "But the Scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe." Gal. iii, 22.
These quotations prove conclusively that God has imputed Adam's sin to all his posterity; and that they, as a necessary consequence, suffer the same penalty threatened their primogenitor in the garden of Eden. "Dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return." "All are of the dust, and all return to dust again." "For now shall I sleep in the dust." "His breath goeth forth, he returneth to his earth." "Death passed upon all men." "Death reigned from Adam to Moses." "As in Adam all die." Numerous texts which might be quoted, bear united testimony to the fact, that the penalty of God's law, for original sin, is strictly enforced upon the condemned, and the guilty. They have, and will, suffer the last iota of punishment threatened in that law. Thus the first difficulty will be removed in harmony with the justice of God, the rectitude of his law, and the honor of his government.
The following objections may be urged:
a. The penalty of the law of God being eternal death, would not a resurrection from the dead, be an infringement upon the claims of that law? This objection grows out of mistaken views of the nature of the penalty under consideration. It is simply death, without any reference to the time the criminal will be in dying, or the time he may remain under the dominion of death. To illustrate: The penalty, in most of the states for murder, is death. Suppose an individual to be adjudged guilty of murder, and sentenced to be hung between two hours specified by the judge, until he is dead, dead—Then suppose that man to remain dead to all eternity, would that prove that the civil law of the land for murder, is eternal death? Certainly not. It is simply death; and when the criminal is dead, the penalty is satisfied, the law has no further claims upon him. If therefore any power could raise such an individual to life, the law would not be infringed: it would have no claims whatever to be satisfied: the man would be as free as though he had never transgressed that law. Just so, in reference to the law of God. Its penalty is simply death. When, therefore, Adam and his posterity shall have died the first death, they will have satisfied the penalty for Adamic transgression. That law having no further claims upon them, God may, if he chooses so to do, raise them all to life again, and reward, or punish, them according to their merit, or demerit; and his law at the same time remain unimpeached; and the rectitude of his character untarnished.
b. Would justice inflict the penalty due the guilty pair upon all the millions of their innocent, and helpless offspring? It was with them a simple question of existence or non-existence. To exist at all, they must inherit the nature of their parents: to inherit their nature, they must heir, with it, all the liabilities, and conditions, to which that nature was subjected by the fall. Is not the present life with all its disappointments, and sorrows, preferable to no life at all? Add to these, all the bliss of faith, hope, and love, in this world; and glory, honor, immortality, and eternal life, in the world to come, which all may obtain, without money and without price. Is this injustice? Rather is it not justice and mercy meeting together and embracing each other?
c. Did not Christ suffer the penalty of the Adamic law? Ans. No: the guilty suffer that penalty. God would not inflict the penalty upon the criminal and the substitute both.
2. The second difficulty, or the penalty for personal sin, is removed upon the principle of inflicting it upon a substitute instead of the guilty. The same principle is involved by executing the penalty upon an accepted substitute as upon the criminal, provided the substitute be, in all respects, an equivalent. The penalty is actually inflicted in the one case just as much as in the other; and the authority of law, and the claims of justice equally maintained in either. That Jesus Christ died in man's stead, as an actual substitute for all those who will comply with the conditions of pardon, may be abundantly proved by numerous plain and explicit texts of Scripture.
In presenting this important feature of the atonement, I will not meddle in the controversy between Calvinists, Socinians, and Arians, but will content myself with a careful elucidation of this fundamental doctrine of our holy religion. In carrying out this design, I propose dividing the Bible evidences upon this point, into two classes:
1st. That class which represents the Jewish sacrifices, under the Mosaical economy, to be both typical and expiatory.
A few general observations in reference to the origin and nature of sacrifices may not be out of place. The history of sacrifices immediately after the fall, is one of the strongest arguments in favor of the Divine origin of the atonement. The fact of their being of divine appointment is clearly demonstrated by the manner in which the Lord manifested his acceptance of Abel's offering, in contradistinction to that of Cain's. "And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering; but unto Cain, and to his offering, he had not respect." Gen. iv, 3-5. Can any good reason be given why the Lord respected Abel's offering more than Cain's, save that "the firstlings of his flock," and their sacrifice, were typical of the sacrificial offering of the "Lamb of God, without spot," for the sins of the world? The one was a sin-offering, the other a thanksgiving offering. For the same reason the Lord expressed such peculiar satisfaction in reference to Noah's sacrifice. "And Noah builded an altar unto the Lord, and took of every clean beast, and every clean fowl, and offered burnt-offerings on the altar. And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake." Gen. viii, 20, 21. Why should Noah be so particular to select of every clean beast, unless it had reference to the immaculate purity of the antitypical victim it represented. The same distinction, between clean and unclean beasts, is made in the subsequent history of Jewish sacrifices. The ram the Lord provided Abraham as a substitute for his beloved son Isaac, is a beautiful type of the Lamb of God who was prepared as a sin-offering for all who have the faith of Abraham. "And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and beheld, behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt-offering in the stead of his son." Gen. xxii, 13. This I understand to be the true object in offering beasts in sacrifice, both by the Patriarch and the Jews: they were "offered up for a burnt or sin-offering in the stead of" the sinner.
The law demanded death: the transgressor confessed his sins upon the head of the innocent victim: the victim was then slain as a substitute for the condemned criminal, and offered upon the altar to make an atonement, or to appease the anger of God, as a type of the death of Christ as our substitute, and the offering of himself "as a sweet smelling savour," to appease the wrath of a sin-avenging God, to render him propitious, or make an atonement for the sins of the world. With these preparatory remarks, I pass to notice, first, the typical character of the Jewish sacrifices. Types, according to theological writers, signify signs or examples, designed by God to prefigure future things: and they must always cease when they reach their antitypes. It cannot be expected that any type will agree with its antitype in every particular, but only in its main features, so that the one may keep in mind the other.
The writers of the New Testament represent many of the ordinances of the Levitical dispensation as being typical. The apostle Paul calls the holy days, new moons, and sabbaths, including with them the services performed in the celebration of these festivals "a shadow of things to come;" "but the body" which casts the shadow, "is of Christ." Col. ii, 16, 17. Compare this with Lev. xxiii, in which the four yearly feasts are brought to view; especially verse 19. "Then ye shall sacrifice one kid of the goats for a sin-offering." The paschal lamb I believe is admitted by all Bible writers to be a type of Christ, and it, together with the sin offering, is found in connection with the same ordinances, which the Apostle declares to be "a shadow," whose substance "is of Christ."
Again the same Apostle when discoursing expressly on the "sacrifices" of the tabernacle calls them "the shadow of good things to come," and places them in contrast with "the very image of the things;" that is, "the good things" just before mentioned. Heb. x, 1. "For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually, make the comers thereunto perfect." In chapters viii, and ix, he tells us that the services performed in the earthly tabernacle prefigured what was afterward to be transacted in the heavenly Sanctuary.
The Apostle, having devoted seven chapters to the priesthood, gives us the result of the whole matter: "Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: we have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; a minister of the Sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man. For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer. For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law: who serve unto the example and shadow (or type) of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for see (saith he) that thou make all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount." Heb. viii, 1-5.
Here the earthly tabernacle, with all its services, is declared to be an "example and shadow of heavenly things;" we are then told that those heavenly things are the great original by which the earthly tabernacle, with all its furniture, was made; and, in the second verse, it is denominated the Sanctuary and the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched and not man: and that Christ, as our high priest, is minister there. From the first to the eighth verses of chap. ix, he draws the analogy between the two tabernacles, and their distinctive ministrations; and at the ninth verse, he informs us that the earthly tabernacle "was a figure (a type) for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices." These instances are sufficient to establish the typical nature of the Jewish sacrifices. I propose showing,
Second, that these sacrifices were vicarious and expiatory. Vicarious signifies acting for another: vicarious suffering is suffering for another: vicarious death, dying for another: expiation, to appease anger, to atone for; or to bring about reconciliation as the result of the atonement.
To prove that this was the intention and effect of the annual sacrifice of the Jews, we need only to refer to them. The penalty of the law, as has been shown, for personal sin is death. The true question, then, to be considered, is whether such sacrifices were appointed by God, and accepted instead of the personal punishment or life of the offender, which otherwise would have been forfeited; if in such case, the life of the victim be accepted instead of the life of man, then the vicarious nature of most of the Levitical oblations may be clearly and easily established.
The high priest, himself being a sinner, must die for his own sins, unless a substitute be accepted; hence Aaron was commanded "to offer his bullock of the sin-offering, which is for himself, and make an atonement for himself, and for his house." Lev. xvi, 6. Then two goats were to be brought before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and lots cast upon them; the one upon which the Lord's lot fell was to be offered for a sin-offering, to make an atonement for the sins of the people. Verses 7-9. "And Aaron shall bring the bullock of the sin-offering, which is for himself, and shall make an atonement for himself, and for his house, and shall kill the bullock of the sin-offering, which is for himself; and he shall take a censer full of burning coals of fire from off the altar before the Lord, and his hands full of sweet incense beaten small, and bring it within the veil: and he shall put the incense upon the fire before the Lord, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy-seat that is upon the testimony, that he die not." Verses 11-13. The mercy-seat was upon the law of God which the high priest had broken, and had he approached it without an atonement for himself, he must have died; but what did he offer as an atonement for himself and his house? Ans. A bullock: the bullock, therefore, died in his stead, and God accepted his death as a substitute for the life of the high priest. It was the blood of the bullock which was accepted. Verse 14. Having made an atonement for himself and his house, he was then required to kill the Lord's goat, to make an atonement for the people. "Then shall he kill the goat of the sin-offering that is for the people, and bring his blood within the veil, and do with that blood as he did with the blood of the bullock, and sprinkle it upon the mercy-seat, and before the mercy-seat. And he shall make an atonement for the holy place, because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their transgressions in all their sins. . . . And he shall go out unto the altar that is before the Lord, and make an atonement for it; and shall take of the blood of the bullock, and of the blood of the goat, and put it upon the horns of the altar round about. And shall sprinkle of the blood upon it with his finger seven times, and cleanse it, and hallow it from the uncleanness of the children of Israel. And the bullock for the sin-offering, and the goat for the sin-offering, whose blood was brought in to make an atonement in the holy place, shall one carry forth without the camp. . . . And this shall be a statute forever unto you: that in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, ye shall afflict your souls. . . . For on that day shall the priest make an atonement for you, to cleanse you, that ye may be clean from all your sins before the Lord. And this shall be an everlasting statute unto you, to make an atonement for the children of Israel for all their sins once a year. Verses 15, 16, 18, 19, 27, 29, 30, 34.
According to the law of sacrifices here given, the following peculiarities must be observed:
1st. The high priest is to sacrifice a bullock for a sin-offering to make an atonement for himself and his house; then a goat, for a sin-offering, to make an atonement for the children of Israel. Here God has appointed the sacrifice of beasts for the sins, both of the priest and the people; but of what avail would these sacrifices be unless they were the appointed means of putting away their sins? That they were the means of remission of sins is evident from the fact that their blood cleansed the sanctuary from "the uncleanness," and "all the sins" "of the children of Israel." But to be the appointed means of the forgiveness of sins, they must be accepted as substitutes for the guilty; for if God, in harmony with the great principles of his moral government, and the claims of justice, could pardon transgression without satisfaction, in the Jewish dispensation, he might also in the Christian; and so any sacrifice for sin in either, would be useless, and unnecessary. But that he could not is evident,
2d. From the fact that he required the life of the innocent victim as a necessary atonement for sin. First. The worshiper must confess his sin, laying his hand upon the head of the sacrifice, by which the sins of the truly penitent were figuratively transferred to the substitute. See Lev. i, 4, 5. "And he shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt-offering; and it shall be accepted for him, (i. e., in his stead,) to make an atonement for him. And he shall kill the bullock before the Lord; and the priests, Aaron's sons, shall bring the blood, and sprinkle the blood round about upon the altar;" &c. Second. After transferring their sins to the substitute, the animal is then killed, and treated as if it had been the actual transgressor, to show that "the wages of sin is death."
3d. The blood of the victim being shed must be sprinkled round about the altar, and upon all the furniture of the holy place, during the daily ministration, to cleanse them from the uncleanness, and from the sins of the people; but on the tenth day of the seventh month, the day of atonement, the high priest kills one animal for himself, and one for the people, and carries their blood into the most holy place, and sprinkles it upon the mercy-seat, which covers a broken law, to cleanse it from the sins of the people; for "without shedding of blood there is no remission." Why is the shedding of blood so necessary that there can be no remission without it? Ans. Because the life is in the blood, and the penalty of the law demands the life of the transgressor; if therefore a substitute be accepted, it must be one that has blood to shed; hence all the sin-offerings were bleeding victims. This is the reason why the blood, in all cases, was required to make an atonement for the sins of the people. Hear the testimony of God himself: "For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul." Lev. xvii, 11. If the penalty of sin be death, and the life of the victim be accepted as an atonement for sin, it follows, as a necessary consequence, that the sacrifice of the beast is vicarious. Also verse 14. "For it is the life of all flesh, the blood of it is for the life thereof." Again in Deut. xii, 24. "Only be sure that thou eat not the blood: for the blood is the life; and thou mayest not eat the life with the flesh."
In all these instances the life of the animal is not only required, but actually accepted instead of the life of the believing, repenting sinner. But it may be objected, that the principal sacrifices of the Jewish dispensation were only typical, looking forward to Christ for their efficacy; that they could not, in themselves, take away sin. This may be admitted without impairing the argument in the least; for if the typical sacrifices took away sin by figure, then their antitype must take them away in fact: and if those were vicarious by figure, then this must be vicarious in fact.
It may further be objected, that many of those sacrifices had reference to fines, and temporal punishments. While this is freely granted, it must be confessed by all, that the principal sacrifices of the Jews, especially those connected with the day of atonement, had exclusive reference to the penalty of God's law for personal sin, which, as has been abundantly proved, is that death which the incorrigible sinner dies after his resurrection to future life. No one believes that the sins of any were ever borne into the most holy place, except those whose characters were accepted by the judge; and whose sins were (at least figuratively) expiated by the ministration of the high priest; and "by the blood of sprinkling." That was what God required of a Jew in order to the pardon of his sins; and to deny pardon to him, through the medium of these religious ceremonies, is to exclude him from all part or lot in God's plan of saving men; for these were the only means of forgiveness God had revealed, or of which he had any knowledge. Many an honest Jew doubtless lived and died in ignorance of the relation those typical sacrifices sustained to the sacrifice of Christ.
4th. To denote God's acceptance of the sacrifice, it was consumed by the hallowed fire, which was kept continually burning upon the altar; and sometimes to show the divine favor, fire from heaven would immediately descend upon the sacrifice. "And there came fire out from before the Lord, and consumed upon the altar the burnt-offering and the fat: which when all the people saw, they shouted, and fell on their faces." Lev. ix, 24. Both were designed to denote God's acceptance of the offering, as a substitution for the penitent. God would not accept the offering of any except the believing and truly penitent.
5th. Salt was sprinkled upon the sacrifice, and holy incense ascended as a sweet smelling savour to God, that he might be propitious, turn away his wrath, and accept the sacrifice in the sinner's stead. Thus we have seen that most of the Levitical sacrifices were typical, vicarious and expiatory. Add to the already accumulated evidence upon this point, the fact that all the allusions to those sacrifices, in connection with the sacrifice of Christ, in the New Testament represent them as being vicarious and expiatory. With this view, we can be at no loss to understand what John the Baptist means, when, pointing to Christ, he exclaims, "Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world." John i, 29. Here direct reference is had to the animal offerings for the remission of sins. To avail myself of the concise manner in which another has arranged the scriptures upon this point: "As the offering of the animal sacrifice took away sin, so Christ as the sacrificial Lamb 'taketh away the sin of the world.' As there was a transfer of suffering and death, from the offender to the legally clean and sound victim, so Christ died, 'the just for the unjust;' as the animal sacrifice was expiating, so Christ is our 'propitiation,' or expiation; as by the Levitical oblations men were reconciled to God, so 'we when enemies, were reconciled to God by the death of his Son;' as in the Jewish dispensation, 'without shedding of blood there was no remission of sins,' so, as to Christ, we are 'justified by his blood,' and have 'redemption through his blood, the remission of sins;' as by the blood of the appointed sacrifices the holy places made with hands were made accessible to the Jewish worshippers, that blood being carried into them, and sprinkled by the high priest, so 'Christ entered once with his own blood into the holy places, (Campbell & McNight,) having obtained eternal redemption for us,' and has thus opened a 'new and living way' for us into the celestial Sanctuary; as the blood of the Mosaic oblations was the blood of the Old Testament, so he himself says, 'This is my blood of the New Testament, shed for the remission of sins;' as it was a part of the sacrificial solemnity, in some instances, to feast upon the victim, so, with direct reference to this, our Lord also declares that he would give his own 'flesh for the life of the world;' and that 'whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; for my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed;'90that is, it is in truth and reality what the flesh and blood of the Jewish victims were in type."
The instances of the use of sacrificial terms, in the New Testament, are almost innumerable; but enough has been said to fully establish the points under consideration.