Earlier text: Friends of the Black Man“Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a free woman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the free woman was by promise. Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children: But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now. Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman. So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free. Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.” The first covenant depended upon the promises of a people, who knew only the birth of the flesh. These promises were that they would keep the ten commandments “indeed.” But, knowing only the birth of the flesh, they were, at the time, transgressors of the law of God, and so were in bondage to sin. And knowing only the birth of the flesh, and having only the mind of the flesh, their promise to obey the law of God “indeed,” was worthless, because “the minding of the flesh is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” If they had made no promise at all to obey the law, they would have broken it; because they knew only the birth of the flesh, and “they that are in the flesh can not please God.” Therefore, without any promise to keep the law, without the new birth they would have continued in the bondage of sin. And when they promised to keep the law “indeed,” and then broke their promise (which, having only the mind of the flesh, it was inevitable that they would do), this brought them only yet deeper into bondage, because to “vow a vow unto the Lord,” and then “slack to pay it,” is “sin in thee.” Deut. 23:21. Therefore, that covenant being entered into by those who were already in bondage, and being a covenant which, by its terms, gendered to bondage, it was only a covenant of bondage—a covenant in which their very efforts to deliver themselves from the bondage in which they already were, brought them only deeper into bondage, the bondage of sin, the bondage of their own works and broken promises, which were only sin. Consequently, all that was seen, or could be seen, in the first covenant was, and is, the broken law. And that this should be forever so plain that no one could fail to see it, when Moses came down from the mount and saw their idolatry, he, having the tables of the law of God in his hands, “cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount.” Ex. 32:19. They were at first breakers of the law. They promised nevermore to break the law. They again broke both the law and their promise not to break it.489And when, therefore, because of this, Moses cast out of his hands the tables of the law of God, and broke them, this was to give to them, and to all people forever, a divine object lesson that in the first covenant, in all their efforts at self-righteousness, and in all their promises not to break the law, no one can ever see anything but THE BROKEN LAW. But there was then and there present the Abrahamic covenant, the covenant of faith, God’s everlasting covenant, to deliver them from the bondage and the yoke of bondage that was upon them because of the covenant of works, of unbelief, into which they had entered. “They could not hope for the favor of God through a covenant which they had broken”—through a covenant in which nothing could be seen but the broken law of God. “And now, seeing their sinfulness and their need of pardon, they were brought to feel their need of the Saviour, revealed in the Abrahamic covenant, and shadowed forth in the sacrificial offerings.” It was the covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob which Moses pleaded to God, for mercy to the people worshiping the golden calf at the foot of the mount, while he was yet in the mount, before he had come down the first time. Notice: in Ex. 32: 1–6 is given the account of the people’s making the golden calf and worshiping it. In verse seven “the Lord said unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves: they have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshiped it. . . . Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them.” Verses 7–10. “And Moses besought the Lord his God, and said, Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people, which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt with great power, and with a mighty hand? . . . Turn from thy fierce wrath, and repent of this evil against thy people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, thy servants, to whom thou swarest by thine own self, and saidst unto them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of will I give unto your seed, and they shall inherit it forever. And the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.” Verses 11–14. Thus it was the Abrahamic covenant, God’s everlasting covenant, that saved the people from the bondage and the curse of their sins, in the first covenant. And so it is ever. Heb. 9: 15. Then Moses came down from the mount, with the tables of the law in his hands, and cast out of his hands the tables of the law, and broke them, thus “signifying that as they had broken their covenant with God, so God had broken his covenant with them;” and signifying that in that covenant there was nothing to be seen but the broken law; and that they “could not hope for the favor of God through a covenant which they had broken.” And “now, seeing their sinfulness and their need of pardon, they were brought to feel their need of the Saviour revealed in the Abrahamic covenant, and shadowed forth in the sacrificial offerings. Now by faith and love they were bound to God as their deliverer from the bondage of sin. Now they were prepared to appreciate the blessings of the new covenant.”—“Patriarchs and Prophets,” page 373. Thus the covenant from Sinai brought them to the covenant with Abraham. The first covenant brought them to the second covenant. The old covenant brought them to the new covenant. And thus the law, which was the basis of that covenant,—the broken law,—was the schoolmaster to bring them to Christ, that they might be justified by faith. Then “the Lord said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou brakest.” Ex. 34: 1. And, says Moses, “I made an ark of shittim wood, and hewed two tables of stone like unto the first, and went up into the mount, having the two tables in mine hand. And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which the Lord spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and the Lord gave them unto me. And I turned myself and came down from the mount, and put the tables in the ark which I had made; and there they be, as the Lord commanded me.” Deut. 10: 3–5. There was then established among the people the sanctuary service, with “the Saviour shadowed forth in the sacrificial offerings;” and with Christ, “the Mediator of the new covenant,” the “one Mediator between God and men,” represented in the high priest in his ministration in the sanctuary. To that sanctuary they brought, in penitence and faith, their offering, and confessed their sin. The blood of their offering was taken by the high priest into the sanctuary, atonement was made for them, and the sin was forgiven. And in the great day of atonement the blood of the offering for all the people was sprinkled upon the mercy-seat, and before the mercy-seat, which was upon the top of the ark, over the tables of the law. Thus between the sinner and the law there was always the sacrifice, representing Christ (and which, in his faith, was Christ, the Surety of the “better testament”), by which was brought to the sinner the forgiveness of his sins, and the righteousness of God, which satisfied all the demands of the law. And thus, through faith in Christ, in this covenant in which Christ is Mediator, and of which he is the Surety, there is seen only the unbroken law. Such was, and is, the true meaning of the new order of things at Sinai, after the breaking of the tables, and after the complete nullification of the first covenant. It was the way of faith, the way of the “righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe.” But, behold, in their unbelief Israel afterward turned all this into a system of works, precisely as was the first covenant. All these sacrifices and offerings, and the ceremonies connected therewith, were given by the Lord to be altogether the expression of faith. But Israel, in their unbelief, missed all this, and made it only a system of works, of ceremonialism. Instead of righteousness coming by faith, and the sacrifices and offerings being but the expression of the faith, they expected righteousness by means of the offering itself, and because of their good work in making the offering. Thus it was in the time of Christ on earth, and in the time of Paul and the Galatians. Thus it was with “the Pharisees which believed,” who had confused the Galatians and driven them back from righteousness by faith to righteousness by works and ceremonialism. And, therefore, Paul could write, and did write, “that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a free woman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the free woman was by promise. Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children.” Thus the very means that God had given to deliver them from the bondage of the old covenant they, through unbelief, had turned into a system of bondage, which corresponded exactly to that bondage of the old covenant. They had, indeed, perverted the new covenant as then expressed, into the very principle of the old covenant—righteousness by works. That which was the gospel as expressed in the sacrifices, offerings, and ministry of that time, they perverted to the bondage of righteousness by works and ceremonialism, exactly as among the Galatians the “Pharisees which believed” were perverting the gospel as expressed in the sacrifice and ministry of Christ himself. And just as Hagar and Ishmael were cast out, that God’s covenant with Abraham might be fully enjoyed; and just as the covenant at Sinai had to be repudiated and cast out, that the blessings of the Abrahamic covenant, the new covenant, might be enjoyed; so when Christ came, and, by the sacrifice and offering of himself and by his own ministration, brought in the fullness of the gospel,—in order that this should be fully enjoyed, there must be repudiated and cast out that system of ceremonies and ceremonialism, that system of righteousness by works, into which Israel had perverted that which in its time was indeed the expression of the true gospel, of righteousness by faith. “Jerusalem which now is. . . . is in bondage with her children.” . . . Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman.” “Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. . . . Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.” And thus was cast out forever the very principle of ceremonialism,—the very principle of the bondage of righteousness by works, in whatever form it might present itself; and there was established in its place the principle of divine liberty in righteousness by faith. “So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free.” And because of this there is sounded to all people forever the blessed rallying cry: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.” The old covenant, the covenant from Sinai, is summed up in the word “SELF.” The new covenant, the everlasting covenant, is summed up in the word “CHRIST.” The old covenant is self and its righteousness. The new covenant is Christ and the righteousness of God. The old covenant is self and the bondage of sin and works of law. The new covenant is Christ and the liberty of righteousness which is by faith. The old covenant—self—must be cast out and utterly repudiated, that the new covenant—Christ—may have its proper place and may manifest its saving power; for the son of the bondwoman can never be heir with the son of the free. HOW WILL IT END?
By Uriah Smith
There is a fascination in the contemplation of the end of evil. When that which annoys, troubles, and distresses us,—that which has fallen like a blight upon our lives, and which has rested with the weight of a deadly incubus upon all our efforts for freedom and progress,—comes to an end, with what relief we behold it lifted from the way! with what joy we behold it disappear! The evil to which we refer is sin. Sin is the world's first and deadly malady. All earth's suffering and sorrow, its woes and disappointments and wrongs, its corruptions and evil passions,—pride, hatred, envy, and revenge,—find their origin, nourishment, and support in this one root of bitterness, this upas tree of sin. Then, extending our view to the physical world, all earth's thorns, malaria, mildew, and desert wastes, its fairest and dearest hopes blighted and buried in the mold and darkness and terror of the tomb,—these, too, all spring from the same deadly root. The world is wrecked and ruined, so long as the virus of this deadly evil courses in the veins of men. The remedy, then, for this world's plague-stricken status is the removal of sin. There are two points of transcendent interest to every believer, in his experience with sin; one is when he personally turns away from sin, renounces its service, discards its promptings and influence, and makes his separation from it complete; and the other is when sin, as a bodily and terrible entity, seeking to deceive and destroy, will be seized by the engines of divine wrath, and itself, and all its concomitants, root and branch, from its foul and venomous head to the tiniest fiber of its poisonous influence, all of which are of the utmost abhorrence to God, will be swept from the universe, and destroyed forever and ever. For sin is not to exist throughout eternity; its victims and votaries are not to mar the peace and harmony of any part of God's new creation, with the terror and torture of endless conscious suffering. This is so because the time must come when “every creature [and that must take in all] which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever.” Rev. 5:13. This language covers the whole of the scene, and there are no exceptions. The great burden resting upon the heart of the awakened sinner is, “Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” Rom. 7:24. The terrible10force of the figure is seen when we contemplate, for a moment, the punishment visited upon hardened criminals in the time of the apostle, from which the figure is drawn. The condemned man was chained fast to a dead body, so that wherever he went he must drag about with him that loathsome, putrefying, decaying thing. There was no escape. With its effluvia of corruption, it must be his constant companion, till he, too, should sink down to the same terrible condition. In the illustration, sin is the dead body to which the sinner is fast chained, and must perish with it at last, unless released. But of himself he has no power to break the chain, and make his escape. When, therefore, he awakes to his situation, it is no wonder that he cries out, in anguish, Who, “who shall deliver me from the body of this death,” or, “from this dead body?” He finds Christ to be the one he needs; and in the joy of deliverance, his song is, “I thank God through Jesus Christ” “there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” This question of becoming free from sin, and the process by which it is accomplished, as it is revealed in the gospel, has power to affect the heart of him who has accepted Christ, as no other question can. With scarcely less interest we go forward to the other epoch mentioned, when the final disposal shall be made of sin, and it shall forever be put away, and, as a harrassing and troublesome feature of existence, shall be remembered no more forever. In the process of putting away of sin, as revealed in the ancient sanctuary service, we trace it first from the sinner, by repentance and confession, to his sacrificial offering; from the offering, representing Christ, to the sanctuary; from the sanctuary to the scapegoat; and in the person of the scapegoat, which is banished into the wilderness, or a “land not inhabited,” to perish, the sins, too, upon him, perished also, and were thus put away from the camp of Israel. This illustrated by symbol the fact that the sins of God’s people are to be put away from them absolutely, and in fact, by the ministration of Christ. But Christ is not the scapegoat. In the antitype, the office of the scapegoat is performed by Satan; Satan is the antitypical scapegoat. In the type, the sins for which atonement had been made in the sanctuary were borne out, and laid upon the head of the scapegoat. In the antitype, the sins which are atoned for in the ministry of Christ are borne out by him, and laid upon the head of the antitypical scapegoat, Satan, and with them he is sent away into the antitypical wilderness, or land not inhabited, even the “bottomless pit” (Rev. 20:2, 3), and, with the sins that are upon him, he perishes there, as it turns into the final lake of fire. Rev. 20:10-15. And Satan is there the representative of all the sins of the redeemed, which have been laid upon him. Evil angels represent their own sins; wicked men represent their own; but the devil represents not only his own, but the sins of all the righteous, which have been forgiven them through the work of Christ in the sanctuary, and then are borne out and laid upon his head for their final destruction. Lev. 16:20-22. Thus, in the vehement flames of the lake of fire, every sin that has ever been committed in all the universe, from the original fall of Satan and his angels, down through the fall of this world by the sin of Adam and Eve, to that of the last sinner who shall open his mouth in blasphemy against God on account of the judgments of the seven last plagues (Rev. 16:21), will be represented, and punished. This is God's last bitter testimony against sin; and clean work will be made. All material, sin-touched things, in all their elements, melt with fervent heat, and raised, by the intensity of the heat of eternal fire, to a gaseous condition, will disappear, and seem to vanish away. Rev. 20:11. But in such a field, it becomes us to pass no point without careful and particular consideration. Let us, then, notice a query that arises in some minds at this point. It is this: If Satan is punished for the sins of the righteous, are not those particular sins punished twice—once in the person of Christ, “who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree,” and suffered, “the just for the unjust” (1 Peter 2:24; 3:18); and again in the person of Satan, upon whom these sins are finally laid for destruction? This is a legitimate query, and is entitled to a candid answer. And the answer is that the sins of the righteous are no more punished twice than are the sins of the wicked; for Christ suffered and died for them the same as for the righteous, yet they suffer for their own sins at last. What, then, about the declaration that Christ suffered for them? The trouble, we imagine, arises from a misconception of the part Christ acts as our substitute. Perhaps without due consideration of the subject, many entertain the idea that Christ, in suffering for the sins of the righteous, suffered all the punishment, in the sense of bodily torture, due to the sins which all the saved committed, and which they would have been obliged to endure if they had failed in their Christian experience and been lost. But then, again we ask, What about the cases of the wicked, for whom Christ suffered the same as he did for the righteous? And in either case, we will let the believer in eternal misery wrestle with this problem of Christ's suffering the penalty for sin, on his own ground. No; the truth seems rather to be that Christ presented himself before his Father's law as an innocent victim, in behalf of man, his own creation, who had become guilty. He undertook to meet for man the divine and immutable sentence, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” His offering of himself was voluntary, and therefore involved no compulsion, nor injustice to anyone. It was from one who was above law; and therefore God could accept it in place of those who were bound by law, but had broken it. It was of such infinite merit that the law could honorably and justly relax its claims upon all who would accept of it, even if the whole world should do so; for he (Christ) was the creator of the whole world, and all that is therein. Col. 1:16. He therefore stood as a representative of them all, in whatever offering he might present to the law in their behalf. But we learn from the type that the removal of sin from the repentant sinner did not cancel the sin itself, but only transferred it to another party, who was then held in place of the one who had sinned. The forgiveness, therefore, which the offering sinner obtained was not independent and absolute, but only relative; that is, as related to the sinner the sin was forgiven; but the sin in itself considered was still recognized as yet in existence, to be disposed of in some subsequent manner. Now Christ has done for us, in fact and in absolute reality, just what the ancient typical offerings of the sanctuary did for the sinner then in figure; that is, he has provided a means through which sin, with its attendant guilt and threatened doom, may be removed from us, and transferred to another party. Thus we can be saved; and sin, our sin, still meet its just deserts, in some other quarter, and in some other agent. Let us, then, consider where this desert, in the case of the sinner, would naturally fall. Sin did not have its origin with mankind. They were not the original agents and promoters of this evil, but were seduced and led away under the powerful temptation of another. And this we apprehend to be the great fact that puts a determining difference between the moral standing of men and that of the devil and his angels. With the one, sin had its inception and birth; and an outbreak so terrible, and causeless, and unprovoked could have no forgiveness. It would not be safe to reinstate to favor and power those with whom such a movement could originate. With men, the case was different. Sin was an evil into which they were led by another party. Hence their wrong could be condoned, and provision be made for their restoration. The practice of sin may therefore be represented as a partnership business. Satan is the original and senior partner; while the sinner is the junior. The latter, having been seduced into that relationship, is allowed, under certain conditions, to leave the company, and step out from under the obligations of the firm. Upon whom will the responsibilities and the obligations of the firm then fall? Mark well the situation, and the answer. The whole responsibility and corporate obligations of the partnership, so far as the sinner is concerned, will then rest upon the only remaining member of the firm, the originator and promoter of the whole evil business, the senior member, Satan. If the sinner chooses to maintain his partnership in that illegitimate business, he can do so, and receive in his own person at last the punishment of his deeds. But it is in his power, if he so desires, to change his present relation to, and connection with, that commerce of hell, unite himself to Christ, and leave his former business with him who is the head of the firm, and primarily responsible for it all. And this is what the Scriptural doctrine of the scapegoat teaches us will be done. The sinner goes free, and Satan receives back upon his own head the sins he has incited the sinner to commit, to answer therefor in the settlement which he at last must meet. Viewing in this light the work of Satan among mankind, it is evident that he has a personal motive of the most powerful kind to induce him to hold persons in sin till their probation is past, and they have no further opportunity to repent; for then they will have to endure the punishment for their own sins, which he otherwise must suffer; and every one who escapes from his power, and secures salvation through Christ, adds an additional weight to his accumulating load of woe. And it must strike every one as right and consistent that this should be so. The sinner has been seduced into sin; but he repents, and is converted. He now loathes and abhors his former life. But standing back of the scene, there is one who is the primary author and instigator of all his past wrongs, the inciting agent in every sinner's sinful deed; and when the transgressor awakes to the true nature of his course, and sees the enormity of his guilt, and wishes to return to allegiance to his Saviour, and put away his sins, what could be more fitting than that those sins should fall back upon the head of him who first gave birth to sin, and who has fostered the growth of every bitter branch from that baleful root? In this the decision of every right-minded intelligence must be that God is just, and that Satan receives no more than his just deserts. Satan, having thus received upon himself the load of sins from which the righteous have been made free, and being confined to the bottomless pit, at that time this desolate earth, is reserved to the day of perdition. 2 Peter 2:9. The thousand years at length expire. The lake of fire, “prepared for the devil and his angels,” appears. These last-named parties are cast therein; and all the wicked, that is, those who are found in league with them, share the same fate. Then every sin ever committed is punished; and in the persons of wicked men, evil angels, and Satan, the whole abominable mass perishes forever. And then is reached that point of transcendent interest when one of the most cheering prophecies in all the Bible can be fulfilled. For at this point, but never before, can that song of jubilee be raised to God, which the seer of Patmos describes in these inspiring words, which will bear repeating: “And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever.” Rev. 5:13. The quenchless flames of the fiery lake have then just spent their force in consuming the rebel hosts. The earth is purified by the fervent heat. No sinner and no taint of sin are left. The new earth appears, to be the everlasting abode of the just. 2 Peter 3:12, 13. No room for Universalism here; for the wicked have all been destroyed. No place for an endless, burning hell to mar the landscape of eternity, nor for the agonizing wail of the unending, conscious misery of the greater part of the human family to bring discord into the universal song of joy; for all those who will be found worthy to be alive then will be only those who are in harmony with God's will, and who are filled with sympathetic joy and praise to him who has taken to him his great power, and begun his reign, and has established them in the home prepared for them “from the foundation of the world.” Thus, through Christ, our experience with sin will end. U. S. “MINUTES are golden, and should be improved to the very best account.”