Now from this feast, so peculiarly prefiguring the Gospel, and being observed with such extra- ordinary strictness, we may learn,
J. The scope and tendency of the Gospel —
[When it reaches the ears and hearts of men, it calls them from the world to serve and delight in God, and that without intermission, from the morning to the evening of their lives. Not that it forhids all servile work ; on the contrary, it requires " every man to ahide in the calling wherein he is called," and to fulfil the duties of his station with assiduity : but, while it leaves our hands at liberty, it forbids that our hearts should be enslaved: they must be reserved for God, and fixed on him alone. The one occupation of our lives must he to offer to him the sacrifices of prayer and praise1: " Rejoice in the Lord always," says the Apostle, " and again I say, Rejoice." Every blast of the trumpet should remind us of the infinite obligations conferred upon us, and of the assurances which God has given us of final and everlasting happiness. It is not a deliverance from temporal bondage, or victory over earthly enemies, that we have to rejoice in, but in deliverance from the wrath of God, and in victory over sin and Satan, death and hell. All this, too, is given us, not by a mere exertion of God's power, but by the death of his Son, and the influences of his Spirit. Shall not we then rejoice ? Again I say, that the Gospel trumpet sounds these things in our ears continually ; and therefore we should keep throughout our whole fives a feast unto the Lord.]
2. The duty of those who embrace it —
[We have already seen what abstraction from the world, and what devotedness to God, were required of the Jews on that day. If they then, who had only the shadow of heavenly things, were to serve God in this manner, how ought ice, who enjoy the substance ! Surely we should serve him without grudging, without ■weariness, and without distraction. If they grudged their numerous and costly sacrifices, or were weary of their long and lifeless services, or had their minds diverted from these poor and "beggarly elements," we should not wonder at it : their very feasts, though suited to the ends for which they were appointed, were burthensome in the extreme. But ours is a spiritual service. True, it may require some sacrifices ; but none that are worthy of a thought, when we consider for whom they are made. As for sin, the mortifying of that should be deemed no sacrifice at all : it is rather like the removal of a leprosy, or the healing of a wound. As for time, or interest, there is nothing to be sacrificed in relation to these, that will
' Heb. xiii. 15.