"AND NO MAN CAN SHUT IT,"
By Editor
We read in one place in the Revelation, "that the temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament." To the church which should be living when this took place, Christ says, referring manifestly to the same event; "Behold I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it." What connection the two events here brought to view have with each other will not probably be apparent at first to those by whom the Bible is but little read, or who have not made the plan of man's salvation a particular study. But to those who are acquainted with the teachings of the scriptures on the subject of the Sanctuary, the ministration therein performed, the nature of its cleansing, and the entrance of our High Priest from the Holy into most Holy Place, at the appointed time, we need offer no explanation. Another consideration engages our attention: it is that when Christ opens before his church a door which no man can shut, there is seen the ark of his testament. This ark of the testament, whether contemplated on the earth, as man was connected with it under the former dispensation, or in heaven as it is here introduced to us, is equally an object of interest. Considering that the Sanctuary of the first covenant was but a type or shadow of the Sanctuary of this, which now exists in heaven, who may tell us that the ark of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man, differs from the former, either in the purposes for which it was used, or the things which it contains? The ark of the earthly sanctuary was called the ark of the testimony, or testament, Ex. xxv, 22. It contained the tables of stone, on which were engraved by the finger of God the ten commandments, and just as he engraved them. Ex. xxv, 16; xxxi, 18. The ark of the heavenly Sanctuary, called also the ark of his testament, as in the text at the head of these remarks, must also contain similar tables, else it was not prefigured by the former. The ark, then, under whatever dispensation we view it, suggests to our mind the same idea: the commandments of God, as he uttered them from Sinai, and engraved them with his own finger. But who can suppose that thoughts of the ark, or the writing it contained, suggested to the mind of a Jew, the observance of the first day of the week as a day of rest! Neither does it suggest such an idea to our minds, but quite another, according to the reading of the fourth commandment contained in it, which says the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God, &c. Such are some of the considerations which naturally connect themselves with the ark of God. But, says the Revelation, "The temple of God was opened in heaven, and there was seen in his temple the ark of his testament;" therefore considerations like the above have been agitating the minds of the people; and as we have seen through the declarations of his word, those tables of the law carefully preserved in the holy temple of the Highest, impressions of the immutability and perpetuity of that royal law have rolled over us, and we could do no otherwise than turn our feet to the keeping of all those holy commandments. Here is a nail in a sure place. The tables of the testimony are enthroned in heaven. There they exist without liability of changing or perishing. Men may legislate and hold councils, and pass decrees, and vent their rage against those who will acknowledge the claims of the royal law, but they cannot touch the law: as high as heaven from earth it still remains above their reach. What must man do to change it? He must ascend to heaven, dethrone Jehovah, burst through the angel guards into the sacred temple, wrest from the ark the mercy-seat, and with his own would-be omnipotent finger, change the writing of the imperishable tables. And yet people will talk about the change of the law as a very little thing, or even proceed further, and speak of its abolition. They might as well talk of abolishing earth and heaven. The temple has been opened in heaven, and there is seen the ark of his testament. I have set before thee an open door; and no man can shut it. Men may endeavor with all their energies to obscure the claims of the law, but they cannot obscure them. They may raise all the stir they please amid the dirt of earth, and chuckle over the dust they succeed in throwing into their own eyes; but we have only, as it were, to look to heaven, and behold the ark of his testament. We have told what man must actually do if he would affect in one jot or tittle the law of God, provided the view we have taken of the passages in Revelation be correct. To prove that we are not correct in our application, it must be shown that the ark of the former dispensation, and consequently that dispensation itself with its attendant ministry, looked forward to no antitype; that there is no temple nor literal city, called the New Jerusalem, in heaven; that there is no ministration in this dispensation in behalf of mankind, of which the former was a figure; that the expression, the ark of his testament, does not now mean what it used to, or that the scene of Rev. xi, 19, is not laid in this dispensation, or that the language has no intelligible meaning. But we have no fears for the bulwarks of truth on these points; and we feel safe for the present in resting down upon the evidence that a door which reveals to us the ark of God's testament has been opened in heaven, with the divine assurance that no man can shut it.